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The  Reformation  of  War 


The  Reformation  of 

WAR.     "By  Col.  J.  F.  C.  Fuller,  D.S.O 

Author    of    ''Tanks    in    the    Great    War,"    "Training    Soldiers 
for  War,"  etc.     :: 


l$t»2(o<i 


/♦ 

The  Spirit  of  Progress:     "Halt!    Who  gees  there?" 

The  Spirit  of  Mankind  :     ' '  War  !  ' ' 

The  Spirit  of  Progress:     "Pass,   War,  all's  well !  ' 


.        ^ 


LONDON:     HUTCHINSON    &     CO. 
PATERNOSTER     ROW,     E.C.       ::      1923 


u 

IDS. 

F87 


DEDICATE    THIS    BOOK 
TO    THE 

Tnnftnown  TlCUmor 

IN    WHOSE    BROKEN     BODY 

LIVES    THE    MEMORY    OF    A    MILLION     BRITISH    DEAD 

WHO    FEAR    NOT    FORGETFULNESS 

IF    THROUGH    THEIR    SACRIFICE 

WAR    MAY     BE    ENNOBLED    AND    REFORMED 


PREFACE 


"  Big  Mars  seems  bankrupt  in  their  beggar' d  host, 
And  faintly  through  a  rusty  beaver  peeps  : 
The  horsemen  sit  like  fixed  candlesticks, 
With  torch-staves  in  their  hand.  .  .  ." 

King  Henry  V.,  IV.  ii.  43. 

"  O  !  now  doth  Death  line  his  dead  chaps  with  steel ; 
The  swords  of  soldiers  are  his  teeth,  his  fangs  ; 
And  now  he  feasts,  mousing  the  flesh  of  man." 

King  John,  II.  i.  351. 

Alas  !  that  I  should  have  been  born  in  the  last  quarter  of  the 
nineteenth  century,  for,  had  this  event  taken  place  a  hundred 
years  earlier,  I  should  have  been  spared  many  troubles,  including 
the  writing  of  this  book.  In  those  days  warfare  was  so  simple, 
and,  by  education,  I  ought  to  be  a  follower  of  Major  Gahagan — 
seeing  that  I  am  an  admirer  of  his  "  tremendous  adventures." 

"  On  they  came  ;  my  guns  and  men  were  ready  for  them.  You  will 
ask  how  my  pieces  were  loaded  ?  I  answer,  that  though  my  garrison 
were  without  food,  I  knew  my  duty  as  an  officer,  and  had  put 
the  two  Dutch  cheeses  into  the  two  guns,  and  had  crammed  the  contents 
of  a  bottle  of  olives  into  each  swivel. 

"  They  advanced — whish  went  one  of  the  Dutch  cheeses,  bang 
went  the  other  !  Alas,  they  did  little  execution.  In  their  first 
contact  with  an  opposing  body,  they  certainly  floored  it,  but  they 
became  at  once  like  so  much  Welsh  rabbit,  and  did  no  execution 
beyond  the  man  whom  they  struck  down. 

"'Hogree,  pogree,  wongree-f um '  (praise  to  Allah  and  the  forty- 
nine  Imaums  !)  shouted  out  the  ferocious  Loll  Mahommed  when  he 
saw  the  failure  of  my  shot.  '  Onward,  sons  of  the  Prophet !  The 
infidel  has  no  more  ammunition.  A  hundred  thousand  lakhs  of 
rupees  to  the  man  who  brings  me  Gahagan's  head  ! ' 

"  I  gave  one  thought  to  my  blessed,  my  beautiful  Belinda,  and 
then,   stepping  into  the  front,   took  down  one  of  the  swivels.     A 

7 


viii  Preface 

shower  of  matchlock  balls  came  whizzing  round  my  head.  I  did 
not  heed  them. 

"  I  took  the  swivel  and  aimed  coolly.  Loll  Mahommed,  his 
palanquin  and  his  men,  were  now  not  above  two  hundred  yards 
from  the  fort.  Loll  was  straight  before  me,  gesticulating  and  shout- 
ing to  his  men.     I  fired — bang  !  !  ! 

"  I  aimed  so  true  that  one  hundred  and  seventeen  best  Spanish 
olives  were  lodged  in  a  lump  in  the  face  of  the  unhappy  Loll  Mahommed. 
The  wretch,  uttering  a  yell  the  most  hideous  and  unearthly  I  ever 
heard,  fell  back  dead .  The  frightened  bearers  flung  down  the  palan- 
quin and  ran.  The  whole  host  ran  as  one  man,  their  screams  might 
be  heard  for  leagues.  '  Tomasha,  tomasha,'  they  cried,  '  it  is 
enchantment.'  Away  they  fled,  and  the  victory  a  third  time  was 
ours.     Soon  as  the  fight  was  done,  I  flew  back  to  my  Belinda.  ..." 

In  his  heart  of  hearts,  who  would  not  be  a  traditional  soldier, 
a  Gahagan  with  his  fair  Belinda  ?  And  yet,  through  some  trick 
in  my  nature,  I  intend  to  inquire  into  the  probabilities  of  future 
warfare  in  place  of  examining  the  tactics  of  the  Ahmednuggar 
Irregulars.  I  admit  it  is  a  surprising  thing  to  do,  seeing  that  I 
have  successfully  passed  all  my  military  examinations  and  some 
even  with  distinction  ;  but  the  ways  of  man  are  inscrutable,  so  I 
will  say  no  more. 

I  intend  inquiring  into  the  nature  of  future  warfare,  not 
because  I  love  war  or  hate  war,  but  because  I  believe  that  war  is 
of  the  inevitable,  and  that  the  greatest  of  all  heresies  and  delu- 
sions concerning  it  is  to  suppose  that  the  Great  War  of  19 14- 
1918  is  the  last  of  all  wars.  That  it  may  be  the  last  of  its  kind  I 
full-heartedly  agree  to,  so  much  so  that  I  believe  the  nature  of  the 
next  great  war  will  be  totally  different  from  the  last  ;  so  different 
that,  even  if  great  nations  go  to  war  in  1950,  the  recent  war  will 
appear  to  those  not  far  distant  fighters  as  a  struggle  between 
barbaric  hordes,  a  saurian  contest,  not  mediaeval  but  primaeval, 
archaic,  a  turmoil,  which  in  the  history  of  the  evolution  of  war- 
fare is  more  distant  from  that  day  than  the  Marne  was  from 
Marathon. 

If,  after  meditating  on  the  views  set  forth  in  this  book,  the 
reader  believes  that  I  am  right,  even  if  only  partially  so,  then  this 
book  is  worth  supporting  ;    if  he  believes,  however,  that  I  am 


Preface  ix 

wrong,  even  if  totally  so,  then  this  book  is  worth  refuting  ;  for 
war  is  a  serious  problem,  and  the  next  war  the  most  serious  of 
all  problems  :  this  at  least  the  last  war  should  have  taught  us.  To 
meditate  is  not  only  to  think  and  think  again,  but  to  think  rightly, 
logically  according  to  facts,  to  discover  the  soul  of  thought  ;  and 
this  can  never  be  done  if  our  minds  are  shackled  by  our  senti- 
ments or  stamped  by  our  emotions.  To  anathematize  war  is  to 
gibber  like  a  fool,  and  to  declare  it  to  be  unreasonable,  is  to 
twaddle  like  a  pedant.  Love  is  unreasonable  and  so  is  madness. 
All  things  divine  and  diabolical  are  unreasonable,  and  mixed  with 
clay  from  out  these  two  unreasoning  opposites  emerges  man,  a 
vibrating  mass  of  unreasoning  instincts  which  will  out,  and 
demoniacally  so  when  they  are  imprisoned.  As  well  attempt  to 
damp  down  Erebus  with  a  duster  as  to  attempt  to  control  the 
primitive  instincts  of  man  by  oath,  syllogism,  or  agreement. 

To  some,  the  one  unforgivable  sin  in  man  is  that  he  is  human 
— a  thinking  beast,  a  discontented  animal ;  these  believe  in 
original  sin.  I  do  not ;  I  believe  in  original  thought  and  spew  out 
that  nauseous  mental  drug  called  imitation.  I  may  be  a  heretic, 
a  military  Luther,  yet  nevertheless  I  try  to  accept  man  as  God 
made  him,  and  not  as  Mr.  Smith  would  like  him  to  be.  Tell  me 
studious  reader,  which  of  us  two  blasphemes,  Smith  or  I  ? 

Frankly  I  am  critical,  not  only  because  I  refuse  to  be  led  by  a 
halter,  but  because,  in  my  heart,  I  have  a  very  warm  place  for  Mr. 
Smith,  who,  as  Private,  Sergeant,  Subaltern  and  General,  has  been 
for  many  years  my  friend  and  companion.  I  have  watched  him 
in  two  long  wars  struggling  against  odds,  and  I  have  learnt  to 
appreciate  his  virtues,  and  his  failings,  and  his  indomitable 
courage.  He  is  a  man  who  possesses  such  natural  pride  of  birth 
that,  through  sheer  contempt  for  others,  he  refuses  to  learn  or  to 
be  defeated.  He  divides  humanity  into  two  classes  :  English- 
men and  niggers,  and  of  the  second  class  some  happen  to  be  black 
and  others  white.  He  only  condescends  to  differentiate  between 
these  sub-classes  by  calling  the  latter  dagoes.  To  him,  all  white 
folk,  outside  his  own  little  islands,  are  such.  From  these  he  has 
nothing  to  learn,  yet  he  is  tolerant,  tolerant  as  he  would  be  to  his 


X 


Preface 


dog  ;  he  has,  in  fact,  raised  the  vice  of  contempt  to  a  high  virtue 
and  on  this  virtue  is  the  British  Empire  founded. 

Having  nothing  to  learn,  through  sheer  power  of  domination, 
he  has  become  the  prince  of  rulers,  and  through  sheer  refusal  to  be 
defeated  by  niggers  the  master  of  improvisation.  He  is  always 
there,  for  the  sun  never  sets  on  his  Empire,  but  he  is  never  ready. 
For  readiness  would  presuppose  fear,  and  what  has  he,  as  an 
Englishman,  to  be  afraid  of  ?  He  is  an  incarnation  of  King 
Henry  V.,  and  every  battle  he  fights  is  an  Agincourt. 

Surely,  then,  it  is  but  folly  to  disturb  his  confidence  ?  It 
would  be  so  if  the  world  were  what  it  was,  but  the  world  has 
changed  and  with  it  has  changed  the  art  of  war.  The  jar  of 
science  has  been  fished  up  from  out  the  deep,  and  its  seal  has  been 
broken,  and  no  English  contempt  for  others  will  coax  the  Jinn 
back  into  his  bottle.  We  must  face  facts.  Courage  is  still  a 
great  virtue,  but  the  power  of  knowledge  is  equally  great,  and 
because  the  Englishman  lacks  this  power,  through  his  sheer 
contempt  to  learn,  and  because  I,  as  an  Englishman,  love  my 
countrymen,  therefore  I  intend  to  flog  Mr.  Smith  with  criticism. 
Whether  I  shall  succeed  in  waking  him  from  his  self-pride  I 
cannot  tell,  for  his  skin  is  thick,  and  he  sleeps  soundly  ;  but  if  I 
can  persuade  him  to  turn  over  in  his  bed  and  for  a  moment  look 
the  other  way — future-wards,  then  I  shall  not  be  disappointed. 
He  will  accuse  me  of  producing  a  nightmare,  and  then,  through 
sheer  contempt  for  such  things,  he  will  either  fall  to  sleep  again, 
or  perhaps  he  will  rise  from  his  couch. 

For  many  years  now  have  I  attempted  to  wake  him,  and  I 
have  written  much  on  war,  so  much  that  this  book  is  but  a  com- 
pilation of  past  writings  brought  up  to  date.*  Much  that  I  have 
written  I  have  already  scrapped,  and  much  that  I  write  now  I 
shall  scrap  if  I  write  more,  for  knowledge  is  an  ever  changing 
power.  The  man  who  never  changes  his  mind,  has  mineralized 
his  intellect.  He  is  but  a  walking  stone  ;  he  may  be  shale  or 
Aberdeen  granite,  it  matters  not,  for  dynamite  will  shatter  him, 

*  In  the  Appendix  will  be  found  a  list  of  these.      I  have  not  quoted  them 
in  the  text  as  in  most  cases  the  wording  has  been  changed. 


Preface  xi 

and  it  is  with  dynamite  I  intend  to  work.  Yet  this  does  not 
prohibit  the  discovery  of  a  still  more  powerful  explosive,  and,  if 
any  of  my  readers  can  present  me  with  one,  I  will  accept  it,  for 
knowledge  to  be  strong,  must  be  free.  To  shackle  it  is,  in  my 
humble  opinion,  to  sin  against  God,  for  His  highest  gift  to  us  is 
intellect. 

In  this  book  I  do  not  intend  to  enter  deeply  into  the  biology 
of  war,  but  in  Chapter  I.  I  will  briefly  examine  this  subject,  for 
there  is  such  a  condition  as  this,  and  so  little  is  it  understood  that 
even  to-day,  in  this  age  of  scientific  thought,  there  are  still  many 
among  us  who  fondly  delude  themselves  into  believing  that 
disarmament  and  words  can  abolish  war.  "  Take  away  our 
weapons  and  we  still  have  our  fists,  our  teeth  and  our  nails," 
shriek  human  instincts  ;  "  and  as  for  words.  ..."  the  answer 
is  all  but  lost  in  a  derisive  laugh,  "  we  will  force  you  to  eat  them 
and  then  we  will  eat  you.  .  .  .  Think  you  that  we  can  be  measured 
by  foot  rule  and  square  ?  Out  fool,  our  road  is  freedom ;  the 
direction  of  our  energy  you  may  control,  but  the  onrush  of  our 
flight  you  will  never  stay." 

To  those  who  thus  believe,  this  book  may  assist  them  to  prepare 
for  war  and  so  lessen,  if  only  for  themselves,  its  catastrophies. 
To  those  who  do  not,  then  may  this  book  assist  them  to  attack 
war.  I  write  for  both,  for  those  whom  I  believe  to  be  wise  and  for 
those  whom  I  believe  to  be  foolish,  for  my  object  is  to  induce  all 
conditions  of  men  not  only  to  talk  of  war  but  to  think  of  war. 
Thus  and  thus  only  shall  we  learn  how  to  understand  war, 
especially  the  nature  of  the  next  war  ;  thus  shall  we  learn  how  to 
enhance  the  virtues  of  war  and  how  to  lessen  its  vices,  and,  above 
all,  how  to  fend  war  off  until  mankind  has  recovered  from  the 
recent  turmoil,  and  not  only  recovered  but  has  replaced  the 
civilization  then  shattered  by  a  nobler  human  edifice.  Without 
war  there  would  be  no  driving  out  of  the  money-lenders  from  the 
temple  of  human  existence.  Without  it,  customs,  interests  and 
prejudices  would  rot  and  putrefy,  and  mankind  would  be  slowly 
asphyxiated  by  the  stench  of  his  own  corruption.  The  Great 
War,  economically,  may  have  been  a  disaster,  yet  the  sufferings 


xii  Preface 

caused  by  it  were  the  birth -pangs  of  a  new  dispensation.  Every 
gain  demands  a  sacrifice,  not  even  a  child  can  be  born  into  this 
world  without  the  agony  of  one  poor  soul,  the  least  offending  of 
all — its  mother. 

That  the  ideas  set  forth  in  this  book  will  be  generally  accepted 
by  soldiers  I  more  than  doubt.  As  a  soldier  I  am  a  heretic.  lam 
a  heretic  because  I  have  torn  up  the  Old  Testament  of  War  and 
in  this  book  have  attempted  to  replace  it  by  the  first  pages  of  a 
new  one.  Novelty  is  a  mental  laxative  which  is  not  tolerated  by 
the  military  monk.  Reader,  if  you  doubt  me,  then  turn  to 
history.  Every  military  invention  of  note  has  either  been  op- 
posed or  attributed  to  the  Devil— gunpowder,  cannon,  naval 
armour,  rams,  rifles,  breech-loading  guns,  gas  and  tanks  have  all 
been  opposed  by  the  military  hierarchy  of  their  day.  But  they 
are  devilish  say  you  ;  then  I  answer  :  "  Fool,  hold  your  tongue," 
for  you  who  are  not  soldiers  are  mentally  just  as  constipated. 
Was  it  not  a  civilian  who  brought  a  bill  before  the  British  Parlia- 
ment "  to  prevent  the  effeminacy  of  men  riding  in  coaches  "  at 
the  time  when  coaches  were  struggling  into  existence,  and  yet 
others  who  decried  the  steamship,  locomotive  and  motor-car. 
Nearly  every  great  discovery  has  been  opposed — chloroform, 
vaccination,  the  law  of  evolution,  salvarsan,  auto-suggestion, 
and  so  might  be  added  example  to  example.  Yet  opposition  has 
had  its  value  ;  it  has  forced  the  new  idea  to  struggle  for  its  exist- 
ence, and  in  this  struggle  has  the  new  idea  grown  strong,  and  as 
it  gains  strength  so  does  the  old  idea  compromise,  knuckle  under 
and,  eventually,  disappear.  Every  pioneer  is  somewhat  of  a 
martyr,  and  every  martyr  somewhat  of  a  firebrand  who  kills  with 
ridicule  as  well  as  with  reason. 

I  have  not  written  this  book  for  military  monks,  but  for 
civilians,  who  pay  for  their  alchemy  and  mysteries.  In  war 
there  is  nothing  mysterious,  for  it  is  the  most  common-sense  of 
all  the  sciences,  and  this  I  will  show  in  Chapter  II.  If  it  possess 
a  mystery,  then  that  mystery  is  unprogressiveness,  for  it  is  a 
mystery  that,  in  a  profession  which  may,  at  any  moment,  demand 
the  risk  of  danger  and  death,  men  are  to  be  found  willing  to  base 


Preface  xiii 

their  work  on  the  campaigns  of  Waterloo  and  Sedan  when  the 
only  possible  war  which  confronts  them  is  the  next  one. 

In  Chapter  III.  I  will  examine  the  ethical  side  of  war,  for  with- 
out a  full  understanding  of  this  side  can  there  be  no  debrutalization 
of  the  art.     In  Chapter  IV.  I  will  show  what  price  the  nations  of 
Europe  paid  for  copying  the  past,  and  then  in  Chapter  V.  how  out/ 
of  folly  blossomed  wisdom  ;    how  it  was  discovered  that  science  I 
was  the  backbone  of  victory,  science  which  since  1870  had  ad- 


vanced like  a  giant  in  seven-league  boots  while  soldiers  were 
forming  fours  and  practising  the  goose-step. 

In  Chapters  VI.,  VII.,  VIII.  and  IX.,  I  will  deal  with  future 
warfare  from  a  general  standpoint,  setting  before  the  reader 
a  series  of  possible  pictures  rather  than  a  mass  of  probable 
detail,  so  that,  from  the  general  panorama,  he  may  carry  away 
with  him  an  idea  of  the  tendencies  of  war. 

I  will  show  that  gas  can  be  made  the  most  humane  of  wea- 
pons ;  that  the  aeroplane  will  create  a  new  line  of  attack  ; 
that  the  tank  is  as  superior  to  present-day  troops  as  modern 
battleships  are  to  galleys  and  galleons.  I  will  examine  the 
purposes  of  fleets  and  speculate  on  their  strategy  and  tactics 
in  the  future,  and  show  that  though  the  principles  of  war  do  not 
change,  their  correct  application  is  subject  to  circumstances. 

In  writing  this  book  it  was  first  my  intention  only  to  deal 
with  the  question  of  future  great  wars,  but,  in  thinking  this 
matter  over,  I  have  considered  it  as  well  to  add  a  chapter, 
Chapter  X.,  on  small  wars  and  internal  security,  as  these  problems 
are  those  which  immediately  concern  us  in  our  great  problem 
of  Imperial  defence.  As  this  question  is  one  which  is  ever 
latent  and  from  which  we  are  never  free,  I  have  dealt  more 
with  present  than  with  future  possibilities,  but  have  again 
attempted  to  avoid  much  detail. 

In  the  remaining  three  Chapters— XL,  XII.  and  XIII.,  I  have 
sketched  the  groundwork  of  reformation.  Taking  the  body 
of  man  as  my  prototype,  I  have  outlined  the  machinery  of 
reorganization.  In  Chapter  XI.  I  have  attempted  to  create  a 
military  brain,  an  organ  which  can  control  the  entire  defence 


xiv  Preface 

forces  of  the  nation.  In  Chapter  XII.  I  have  attempted  to 
fashion  a  mould  in  which  a  new  army  can  be  cast,  and  in  Chapter 
XIII.  I  have  attempted  to  show  that  beyond  the  mind  and  body 
of  man  stands  society,  and  so  also  with  the  defence  forces, 
beyond  these  lies  the  nation,  and  that  between  these  two  must 
there  be  harmony ;  consequently  without  national  reform 
can  there  be  no  true  military  reform,  for  the  reform  of  both 
is  interdependent. 

Now  that  it  is  written  and  I  can  look  back  on  this  book,  it 
appears  to  me  that  I  have  not  so  much  set  out  to  discover  a 
new  world  as  to  uncover  an  old  one  :  "  The  thing  that  hath 
been,  it  is  that  which  shall  be  ;  and  that  which  is  done  is 
that  which  shall  be  done  :  and  there  is  no  new  thing  under  the 
sun." 

For  the  student,  let  him  visit  the  London  Museum  and  on 
the  top  storey  he  will  find  in  a  small  room  a  model  of  St.  James's 
as  it  was  in  1814.  On  it  he  will  see  rising  out  of  the  Green 
Park  a  temple.  It  is  called  the  "  Temple  of  Concord,"  and 
on  the  wall  he  will  see  a  picture  of  this  "  pious  hope  "  which 
resembles  a  painted  wedding  cake  surrounded  by  smoke  and 
fire,  and  from  the  inscription  on  this  picture  the  student  will 
learn  that,  at  midnight  of  August  1,  18 14,  London  witnessed 
the  celebration  of  the  Great  Peace. 

The  booming  of  those  maroons  and  the  star  showers  of 
those  rockets  have  long  passed  into  oblivion,  and  so  has  that 
Temple  of  Concord.  A  hundred  years  later,  almost  to  the 
minute,  Europe  was  once  again  flaming  with  war.  What  a 
lesson  !     Indeed  "  there  is  no  new  thing  under  the  sun." 

In  this  book  I  shall  omit  much  which,  were  books  less  ex- 
pensive to  produce,  I  should  have  included.  Some  points  I 
shall  repeat  again  and  again,  and  with  a  purpose — to  drive 
them  home.  Traditionalism  is  the  dragon  I  am  out  to  slay, 
that  servile  monster  which  breathes  forth  wars  of  bloodshed 
and  destruction.  I  will  show  that  the  true  purpose  of  war  is 
to  create  and  not  to  destroy,  and  that,  still  to-day,  all  armies 
and  fleets  are  spell-bound  by  the  past,  and  that  the  nations 


Preface  xv 

which  support  them  and  pay  vast  sums  for  their  maintenance, 
are  paying  for  either  cut-throats  or  for  phantoms. 

Human  intuition  is  nearly  always  right,  but  human  tuition 
is  nearly  always  wrong,  and  in  this  book  I  will  examine  the 
meaning  of  these  two  forces,  how  instinct  is  true  and  how  learn- 
ing is  so  frequently  false.  It  is  the  next  war  which  vitally  con- 
cerns us  and  not  the  last,  and  this  next  war  I  believe  will  be 
very  different  from  the  last,  and  here  is  my  first  repetition. 
Quite  possibly,  when  Europe  is  once  again  aflame,  those  already 
enlisted  may  find  the  army  a  safer  habitation  than  an  office 
in  Lombard  Street.  Then,  in  place  of  witnessing  the  Israelites 
fleeing   to   Brighton,  shall  we  behold  them   flocking   to   Great 

Scotland  Yard  ! 

J.  F.  C.  F. 
Cafe  des  Aveugles, 

November  20,  1922. 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER 

Prologue         

I. — The  Origins  of  War       .... 
II. — The  Science  and  Art  of  War 
III. — The  Ethics  of  War         .... 
IV. — The  Last  Lap  of  the  Physical  Epoch    . 
V. — The  First  Lap  of  the  Moral  Epoch 
VI. — The  Weapon  of  the  Future  . 
VII. — The  Future  of  Air  Warfare 
VIII. — The  Future  of  Land  Warfare 
IX. — The  Future  of  Sea  Warfare 
X. — The  Problem  of  Imperial  Defence 
XL — The  Meaning  of  Grand  Strategy  . 
XII. — The  Reformation  of  the  Army 
XIII. — The  Peace  which  Passeth  Understanding 

Epilogue 

Appendix.  Bibliography 


PAGE 

I 

6 

24 
56 

75 
102 
120 

-v 

136 
152 

170 

189 

211 
229 
256 
279 

285 


The  Reformation  of  War 


PROLOGUE 


COMMON-SENSE 


Philosophy  is  a  love  of  wisdom,  and  wisdom  is  the  power  of 
forming  the  fittest  judgments  from  whatever  premises  are 
under  consideration.  Philosophy  is,  therefore,  an  evolutionary 
system  of  thought  which  has  as  its  objective  the  survival  of  the 
fittest  thoughts.  While  animals  progress  through  the  struggles 
of  body,  humankind,  as  distinct  from  animals,  progresses 
through  the  struggles  of  mind,  but  with  this  difference  :  that, 
while  in  animal  life  every  unit  must  struggle  in  order  to  sur- 
vive, in  human  life  the  struggles  of  one  great  brain  will,  on 
occasion,  remould  an  epoch.  We  find,  therefore,  that  human 
beings  may  be  divided  into  two  categories — the  masters  (super- 
men) and  the  slaves  (super-monkeys)  ;  in  fact,  into  creators 
and  imitators.  This  has  always  been  so,  and  is  likely  to  remain 
so,  for  without  the  second  there  can  be  no  opposition  to  the 
first,  and  opposition  is  the  manure  of  progress,  and  progress, 
seemingly,  is  of  the  will  of  God. 

If  the  aim  of  wisdom  is  to  arrive  at  the  fittest  judgments, 
then,  indeed,  is  common-sense  the  true  philosophy  of  life.  To 
do  the  most  appropriate  thing  at  any  moment  is  what  is  generally 
known  as  a  common-sense  act ;  in  other  words,  common-sense 
may  be  defined  as  :  "  thought  and  action  adapted  to  circum- 
stances." 

Common-sense  is  the  secret  of  the  masters,  but  to  the  slaves 

i 


2  The  Reformation  of  War 

it  is  the  greatest  of  all  heresies,  for  to  doubt  that  "  thought 
and  action  are  adapted  to  conventions  "  is  to  them  the  one 
unforgivable  sin.  In  the  great  masters  common-sense  is  not 
only  spontaneous  but  prescient,  for  not  only  are  actions  adapted 
to  circumstances,  but  the  circumstances  themselves  are  seen 
in  advance  of  their  happening.  In  this  form  common-sense 
is  known  as  "  genius,"  which,  in  nature,  is  creative  and  not 
formative  ;  that  is  to  say  it  produces  wholes  and  does  not 
merely  set  together  parts.  Genius  may  be  classed,  therefore, 
as  masculine  in  character,  for  it  produces  the  seed  of  a  new 
life,  while  labour,  the  work  of  the  slaves,  is  feminine,  for  it 
takes  many  months,  many  years,  to  build  the  finished  article, 
and,  then,  it  frequently  spoils  it  in  the  process. 

In  the  philosophy  of  common-sense  there  is  no  absolute 
truth,  and,  whether  the  absolute  exists  or  not,  it  does  not  fall 
within  its  purview  ;  metaphysics  have  but  a  very  subordinate 
place  in  the  realms  of  common-sense,  the  normal  sphere  of 
which  is  the  existing  and  the  evolution  of  the  actual. 

The  absolute,  especially  under  the  conception  of  the  absolute 
truth,  is  the  undying  cause  of  mental  warfare.  Millions  of 
brains  have  thought  upon  this  subject,  hundreds  of  thousands 
of  books  have  been  written  to  explain  it,  and,  worst  of  all,  millions 
of  lives  have  been  sacrificed  in  the  wrangles,  quarrels  and  dis- 
putes which  have  arisen  through  its  questing.  To  the  multitude, 
this  search  after  the  incomprehensible  has  worked  like  some 
deadly  drug.  To  them  it  has  invoked  false  dawns  to  still-born 
days.  To  them,  for  a  moment,  it  has  shattered  darkness,  it 
has  tantalized  them  with  unreachable  things — fraternity  and 
the  death  of  strife  ;  it  has  shown  them  the  squalor  and  sordid- 
ness  of  their  surroundings,  and  then  it  has  left  them,  dazzled 
and  squinting,  with  the  meanness  of  their  thoughts,  the  small- 
ness  of  their  hearts,  and  the  impotence  of  their  souls,  to  scramble 
back  into  the  night  which  knows  no  dawn,  breathing  profane 
words  and  groping  after  moonbeams  and  shadows. 

The  absolute   may  be   "  The   Pearl   of   Great   Price  "... 
The  Stone  of  the  Wise  "...  or  "  The  Lamp  of  Illimitable 


Prologue  3 

Light."  For  the  great  it  may  be  the  "  Universal  Solvent," 
but  for  the  multitude,  and  the  world  is  made  up  of  multitudes, 
it  is  with  the  rush-light  of  common-sense  that  we  must  seek 
to  guide  humankind,  lest  they  be  utterly  blinded.  For  them, 
progress  is  not  to  be  sought  for  in  the  solution  of  some  infinite 
equation,  but  in  the  banishing  of  phantoms  and  the  pricking 
of  many-coloured  bubbles  ;  for  each  man  carries  about  with 
him  a  book  of  lies — his  preconceived  thoughts,  and  lives  in  a 
world  shackled  by  Euclidian  lines — his  fears  and  prejudices. 
Each  word  must  be  rewritten,  each  line  dissolved,  and  he  who 
can  replace  "  length  without  breadth "  by  a  cobweb,  frees 
humanity  until  the  web  be  broken.  Slavery  is  the  self -damna- 
tion of  the  credulous,  and  it  must  ever  be  remembered  that 
most  men  are  mental  malingerers. 

In  the  philosophy  of  common-sense,  the  goal  is  contentment, 
and,  to  the  multitude,  this  goal  is  symbolized  by  health  and 
happiness.  Hitherto,  so  I  feel,  the  great  peace  and  war  thinkers 
have  given  to  the  crowd  speculations  and  uncertainties,  vocifera- 
tions and  the  ululation  of  words,  full  of  meaning  to  them- 
selves, possibly,  but  unintelligible  to  their  servants :  sterile 
words,  words  which  cannot  sprout  or  wax,  inert  words  without 
blood  or  sap,  cold  words  without  warmth  or  fire.  Words 
which,  being  either  not  understood  or  misinterpreted,  cause 
wrangles,  arguments  and  quarrelling — truly  unbalanced  things 
and,  therefore,  contrary  to  common-sense  which  aims  at  an 
equilibrium  of  reason  and  action. 

To  the  masses  of  humankind  there  are  three  happinesses 
in  this  world — sex,  food  and  freedom.  "  Kiss,  eat  and  do  as 
we  like."  Thus,  towards  the  abbey  of  Theleme  do  they  wend 
their  way,  bickering  about  things  spiritual  and  material,  their 
very  longings  being  filled  with  the  itch  of  war.  They  pluck 
dead  fruit  and  in  anger  they  turn  on  one  another,  one  saying  : 
"  What  profiteth  a  man  if  he  gain  the  whole  world  and  yet  lose 
his  soul,"  and  another  with  blasphemy  replying :  "A  pair 
of  boots  is  more  important  than  all  your  Madonnas."*     Thus 

*  "  Memoirs  of  a  Revolutionary,"  Krapotkin,  vol.  ii.  86. 


4  The  Reformation  of  War 

are  the  masses  rent,  one  side  seeking  some  infinite  desire,  and 
the  other  some  finite  balsam.  Thus,  between  the  absolutism 
of  both  is  the  grist  and  chaff  of  life  ground  into  war.  Propor- 
tion is  lost ;  there  is  no  give  or  take  ;  life  grows  rigid,  laughter 
ceases,  one  side  cries  "  vice  "  and  the  other  "  virtue."  The 
veil  of  the  temple  of  peace  is  rent,  and  behind  it  grins  the  god 
of  war — that  panic  mystery  of  progress. 

Common-sense  merely  shifts  these  points  of  view,  bringing 
them  within  one  focus.  Vice  is  the  salt  which  gives  life  its  savour 
— true  !  Like  a  patch  on  a  girl's  cheek,  it  accentuates  a  beauty 
which  is  not  its  own.  Vice,  in  fact,  is  the  spur  which  sets  virtue 
in  motion.*  The  savour  of  life  is  its  virtue,  and  yet  this  savour  is 
far  from  being  the  mere  salt,  which,  of  itself,  leads  to  unquenchable 
desire.  The  common-sense  man  does  not  inveigh  against  vice  or 
exalt  virtue ;  when  contentment  does  not  exist,  and  discontent 
is  war,  he  harmonizes  these  two.  He  does  not  seek  a  universal 
balsam,  but  a  human  anointment  by  an  integration  and  agree- 
ment ;  not  an  absolute  truth,  but  an  equation  of  circumstances 
which  will  be  true — that  is,  will  be  righteous  as  long  as  these  cir- 
cumstances exist.  He  seeks  the  best  at  any  given  moment  and 
not  the  best  for  ever.  He  is  the  arbitrator,  and,  like  a  good  judge, 
he  is  so  rare  a  being  that,  once  he  has  harmonized  one  set  of 
differences,  he  should  not  be  allowed  to  take  root ;  he  has  his 
circuit  and  should  journey  from  one  discontent  to  another,  so 
that  his  energies  may  never  slacken  and  ever  find  new  worlds  to 
conquer. 

In  war  common-sense  plays  a  similar  part.  If  peace  be  called 
virtuous  and  war  vicious,  then  it  is  in  the  harmonization  of  their 
differences  and  not  in  the  permanent  state  of  either  that  a  solu- 
tion to  righteousness  must  be  sought.  To  understand  this 
righteousness  we  must  understand  what  peace  and  war  entail. 

*  "  Vice,  crime,  disease,  decay  and  death  are  just  as  natural  and  necessary 
events  as  virtue,  health,  growth  and  life  ;  ever  present  processes  that  are  kept 
in  check  while  evolution  is  in  full  vigour,  they  will  increase  when  it  has  reached 
and  passed  its  height :  their  presence  and  functions  now  are  the  augury  of  a 
larger  presence  and  function  some  day." — "  The  Pathology  of  Mind,"  Henry 
Maudsley,  p.  192. 


Prologue  5 

We  must  understand  man  as  man,  and  the  contentedness  and 
discontentedness  of  man  as  human  and  not  as  metaphysical 
problems.  To-day  we  stand  at  the  parting  of  the  ways,  behind 
us  lingers  an  old-world  conception  rooted  in  the  events  symbo- 
lized by  "  1815."  In  front  of  us  is  cast  the  shadow  of  a  new  era 
which,  in  its  time,  will  be  symbolized  by  "  1918."  Both  were 
conceived  in  peace,  both  were  born  in  war.  Nations  must  either 
move  or  perish,  they  dare  not  wait  for  miracles  to  reincarnate 
them,  for  to  wait  is  to  paralyse  the  will  to  act.  This  will  is  the 
true  wand  of  the  magician,  that  sceptre  of  common-sense  which 
rules  the  orb  of  human  reason. 

Thoughtful  reader,  common-sense  has  been  my  rush-light,  it 
has  lit  my  path  through  the  chaos  of  past  wars  and,  by  the  glimmer 
of  its  flickering  flame,  I  have  attempted  to  peer  down  the  rugged 
track  of  future  warfare,  that  track  which  at  some  uncertain  day 
to  come  will  once  again  loom  into  a  great  highway  of  strife  along 
which  will  tramp  those  legions  yet  unborn.  How  wends  the 
trail,  what  of  the  country  it  traverses  ?  Is  it  mountainous  or 
rocky,  wooded  or  a  region  of  swamps  ?  And  what  of  those  yet 
distant  warriors,  are  they  armed  as  to-day,  are  they  of  the  past  or 
for  the  future  ?  Have  they  common-sense  emblazoned  on  their 
standards,  or  do  they  advance  under  the  faded  banners  of  tradi- 
tion ?  Are  their  actions  adapted  to  the  circumstances  which 
will  then  confront  them  ?  Do  they  aspire  after  miracles,  or 
drunken  are  they  on  the  valour  of  ignorance,  or  are  they  equipped 
with  that  unshakable  confidence  begotten  of  imagination  and 
nurtured  by  foresight  ?  These,  in  all  modesty,  for  learning  has 
made  me  doubtful,  are  some  of  the  questions  I  shall  attempt  to 
answer.     The  book  now  opens  :  fare  thee  well  ! 


THE   ORIGINS   OF   WAR 

THE  philosophy  of  war  and  the  philosophy  of  life  are  but 
synonyms  for  that  system  of  knowledge  which  resolves 
human  phenomena  into  their  causes  by  an  analysis  of  the  struggle 
for  existence.  This  struggle,  though  science  differentiates 
between  organic  and  inorganic,  eventually  finds  its  source  in  the 
molecular  and  atomic  energies  of  matter  and  in  the  energy  of  the 
ether  itself.  Beyond  these,  human  understanding,  at  present, 
is  unable  to  penetrate. 

We  start  with  the  known,  the  world  as  we  think  it  to  be,  as  it 
has  seemed  to  us  and  is  likely  to  continue  to  seem ;  we  travel 
into  the  unknown,  yet  ever  before  us  and  behind  us  hang  the 
curtains  of  the  unknowable,  distant  in  places,  close  touching 
here  and  there.  Through  these  we  cannot  see,  even  with  the 
eyes  of  uttermost  imagination.  Though  war  and  the  struggle  for 
existence  may  cease,  could  we  but  penetrate  this  veil,  all  our 
inferences  so  far  go  to  prove  that,  on  this  side  of  it,  war  is  an 
ultimate  factor  in  Nature  as  she  reveals  herself  to  us  through  the 
limitations  of  the  human  mind. 

We  think  we  can,  symbolically,  picture  to  ourselves  a  state  of 
complete  inertia,  just  as  we  think  we  can  picture  to  ourselves  the 
shape  of  a  fourth  dimensional  figure,  but,  in  reality,  such  a  state 
is  incomprehensible,  though  in  some  form  or  another  it  is  innate 
in  every  human  heart.  The  religiously  minded  seek  the  life 
eternal,  where  there  is  no  marriage  or  giving  in  marriage  ;  in 
other  words,  no  duality  ;  likewise  the  city  clerk  he  also  seeks, 
even  if  an  inadequate,  }ret  a  fixed  wage  so  that  he  may  be  relieved 

6 


The  Origins  of  War  7 

from  the  horror  of  plus  and  minus  quantities.  Thus,  throughout 
life  itself,  do  we  see  on  the  one  side  a  desire  for  rest,  and  on  the 
other  a  desire  for  activity  in  order  that  rest  may  some  day  be 
accomplished. 

I  will  postulate  that  we  do  start  with  inertia,  the  unknowable  ; 
then,  let  us  picture  to  ourselves,  how  we  cannot  say,  that  an 
activity  is  begotten  within  it  :  this  activity  then  is  war,  whatever 
may  be  its  complexion,  for  it  will  produce  within  inertia,  a  vibra- 
tion, a  disruption,  a  tearing  and  rending  asunder.  Henceforth, 
we  have  a  duality — tendencies  towards  rest  and  tendencies 
towards  activity,  stability  and  mobility,  a  clash  between  these 
two  in  the  ether,  in  matter  and  in  life.  Thus  has  the  roar  of  war 
deafened  the  uttermost  limits  of  eternity  before  the  stars  twinkled 
or  the  sun  shone,  and,  as  far  as  the  human  mind  can  fathom,  is 
likely  to  resound  through  these  abysmal  depths  until  the  uni- 
versal blankness  of  inaction  covers  the  infinite  with  its  pall  of 
perfect  peace. 

This  desire  for  peace,  and  for  the  peace  which  passeth  under- 
standing, is  innate  in  the  heart  of  man  :  "  anything  for  a  quiet 
life,"  is  the  cry  of  the  millions  which  surround  us.  It  forms 
their  spiritual  goal,  which  is  quite  unattainable  since  Eve  ate  of 
the  apple — henceforth  "  in  the  sweat  of  thy  face  shalt  thou  eat 
bread,  till  thou  return  unto  the  ground."  Allegory  though  this 
may  be,  Eden  is  not  of  this  life,  for,  though  the  lion  may  be 
brought  to  lie  down  with  the  lamb,  the  struggle  for  existence  will 
still  continue.  Lambs  will  go  on  nibbling  the  young  grass,  and 
lions  will  die  of  indigestion,  and  the  world  will  be  peopled  with 
gambolling  foolish  folk  who,  eventually,  will  find  their  normal 
level  through  the  horrors  of  over-production.  Thus  does  Nature 
instil  the  battle  in  one  form  or  another  in  order,  presumably,  to 
improve  the  stock,  so  that  the  curse  of  Eden  may  be  accomplished. 

Though  the  desire  of  man  is  peace,  the  law  of  life  is  war  ;  the 
fittest,  mentally  or  bodily,  survive,  and  the  less  fit  supply  them 
with  food,  labour  and  service.  Life  lives  on  life  ;  look  around 
and  see  if  this  be  not  true,  and  though  the  majority  of  human 
kind  has  given  up  cannibalism,   many  are  still  meat  eaters  ; 


8  The  Reformation  of  War 

nevertheless,  quite  possibly  the  flesh  of  animals  may  also,  some 
day,  become  revolting  to  the  palate,  and  men  may  even  gasp 
with  horror  at  the  idea  of  boiling  a  turnip.  The  advent  of  syn- 
thetic food  will,  however,  in  no  way  alter  the  law  of  life,  though 
it  may  change  the  convolutions  of  the  intestines ;  for  operate 
this  law  must,  in  the  pulsations  of  the  amoeba  and  in  the  vibra- 
tions of  the  highest  mind  of  that  super-race  with  whom,  for  nearly 
three  thousand  years,  we  have  been  persistently  threatened  by 
revolutionaries — yet  we  remain  human,  ever  and  always  human, 
and  this  is  the  keystone  in  the  arch  of  our  philosophy. 

Thus  it  will  be  seen  that  the  pendulum  of  life  swings  between 
two  extremes — fear  and  love,  and  though  man  desires  rest,  the 
hand  which  holds  the  balance  has  ordained  that  he  must  seek  it 
through  activity.  Man  possesses  no  right  to  live,  but  solely 
might  to  kill  and  so  to  preserve  life ;  this  is  his  one  great  birth- 
right which  holds  good  not  only  for  primitive  man  but  for  human 
society  as  it  is  organized  to-day  ;  for  do  not  we  find  that,  in  most 
countries,  in  order  to  curb  this  might,  the  penalty  is  death,  that 
is  the  very  exercise  of  it,  or  imprisonment  for  life,  which  is  but  a 
delayed  execution  at  the  public  expense  ? 

True,  man  desires  life,  for  it  is  sweet  to  live  ;  he  desires  life, 
and  though  there  can  be  no  right  in  this  desire,  it  is  the  strongest 
of  his  instincts,  the  instinct  of  self-preservation — the  ultimate 
source  of  all  human  sorrow  and  of  all  human  joy.  This  instinct 
urges  him  to  protect  his  life,  to  preserve  it,  to  link  his  life  with 
that  of  woman,  to  duplicate  their  lives  in  the  lives  of  their  children 
and  to  protect  this  duplication.  In  the  family,  primaeval  or  of 
to-day,  there  is  a  human  right — protection,  which  in  its  turn,  like 
an  arch,  rests  on  the  abutments  of  physical  strength  and  mental 
cunning.  The  stronger  survive  through  brute  strength,  and  the 
more  cunning  through  craft ;  thus  begins  that  interminable 
struggle  between  muscle  and  mind  which  is  the  mainspring  of  all 
progress. 

In  the  primitive  family  man  is  the  hunter,  he  has  but  one 
object  in  life — to  kill ;  to  kill  for  food,  to  kill  for  warmth  and  to 
kill  for  protection  ;    his  impulse  is  purely  an  active  one.     With 


The  Origins  of  War  9 

woman  it  is  otherwise,  her  desires  are  not  active  but  restful. 
In  place  of  killing,  her  will  is  to  preserve  life.  She  prepares  the 
food  supplied  to  her  by  her  husband,  the  hunter  ;  she  suckles 
her  children,  she  fashions  the  home.  Habit  teaches  her  order, 
from  order  emerge  customs  and  laws.  In  her  long  lonely  vigils, 
while  her  man  is  on  his  bloody  quest,  she  dreams,  and  from  her 
dreams  are  born  the  gods,  and  from  the  contemplation  of  her 
children,  as  they  roll  in  the  grass  at  her  feet,  is  conceived  the 
stupendous  vision  of  immortality. 

In  the  family  is  born  the  spirit  of  co-operation,  that  working 
together  for  the  common  good  through  an  integration  of  ideas 
and  by  a  division  of  labour.  Then  families  struggle  with 
families,  conquer  and  coalesce,  and  tribes  emerge  and  are  welded 
into  nations.  And,  when  history  opens  her  gloomy  portals, 
there  stands  War — the  god  of  creative  destruction,  that  grim 
synthetic  iconoclast. 

I  will  now  examine  this  struggle,  not  from  the  point  of  view 
of  the  so-called  "  Realities  of  War,"  so  frequently  described  by 
shell-shocked  war  correspondents,  but  from  that  pivotal  point — 
the  human  instincts. 

All  human  activities  are  ultimately  girt  by  a  mysticism 
unfathomable  to  the  reason,  which  may  only  be  sensed  by  a  vague 
irrational  intuition.  The  mentality  of  the  great  captain  is 
difficult  to  analyse  ;  frequently,  he  is  a  student,  but  study 
alone  will  not  create  him  ;  frequently,  he  is  inordinately  brave, 
but  neither  will  courage  alone  differentiate  him  from  the  herd. 
Possibly  he  is  but  the  focal-point  of  his  epoch,  fashioned  by  the 
very  circumstances  which  he  eventually  controls  by  fusing 
with  them  his  own  creative  power.  Identifying  his  power  with 
that  of  his  age,  he  concentrates  it  and  wields  the  new  creation 
like  a  weapon  ;  conjuring  forth  the  primal  instincts  always  latent 
in  man,  he  leashes  and  unleashes  them,  and  men  follow  his  touch, 
harnessed  as  they  are  to  his  will  and  he  to  theirs.  This  awaken- 
ing of  the  primitive  instincts  is  one  of  the  most  mysterious 
forces  in  war,  a  force  which,  if  understood,  will  show  that  either 
wars  are  inevitable,  or  that  the  excitement  which  goes  to  engender 


io  The  Reformation  of  War 

them  must,  during  peace  time,  find  a  healthy  outlet  if  they  are 
to  be  kept  in  leash. 

The  dormant  instincts  in  man,  once  let  loose,  normally 
crystallize  round  a  leader,  who,  in  the  eyes  of  his  followers,  becomes 
a  super-man,  a  power  to  be  venerated.  During  life  his  creative 
mind  controls  them,  but,  when  dead,  his  spirit  petrifies,  and 
what  was  once  the  focal-point  of  individual  energy  becomes 
the  static  tombstone  of  collective  idolatry.  An  image  is  raised  ; 
though  called  by  his  name  it  is  soulless,  it  breathes  no  new  word, 
neither  can  it  move,  for  it  is  lifeless,  it  is  but  a  make- 
belief. 

Round  this  image  congregate  the  priests  of  the  cult  of  war  ; 
their  words  are  his  words,  but  his  words  are  dead  words,  words 
of  the  past,  which  now  bear  little  relationship  to  truth,  who  never 
stays  her  onward  step.  Doctrines  grow  into  idolatrous  dogmas, 
so  that  the  worship  of  idols  replaces  the  belief  in  living  things. 
It  is  thus  that  nations  are  destroyed  through  the  crystallization 
of  ideas  in  traditions  and  stagnation  of  effort  due  to  lethargy 
of  thought. 

From  the  military  aspect,  such  idolatry  as  this  does  not  only 
mean  unprogressiveness  in  the  science  and  art  of  war,  but  also 
aggressiveness  towards  indulging  in  war,  this  aggressiveness 
being  due  to  two  main  causes  : 

(i.)  The  valour  of  ignorance  of  the  nation. 

(ii.)  The  barbaric  stimulus  of  the  army. 

The  first  is  due  to  a  lack  of  power  to  control  policy.  Nations 
are  always  competitors,  especially  great  civilized  nations,  and, 
consequently,  the  weaker  is  forced  to  accept  the  will  of  the  stronger, 
and,  when  the  weaker  happens  to  be  a  prosperous  and  wealthy 
nation,  this  acceptance  of  the  will  of  the  stronger,  and  sometimes 
less  prosperous,  is  irritating.  So  much  so  is  this  the  case  that 
the  weaker,  not  being  able  to  adjust  by  force  the  balance  to  its 
favour,  resorts  to  craft.  Craft  leads  to  secrecy,  and  secrecy  to 
suspicion  and  discontent,  which  frequently  lead  to  an  open 
quarrel  between  the  parties  concerned,  the  one  not  knowing  the 
intention  of  the  other. 


The  Origins  of  War  11 

If  we  now  examine  modern  history,  we  shall  find  that,  though 
military  might  has  sometimes  detonated  wars,  the  most  prevalent 
detonator  has  been  diplomacy  ;  craftiness  and  especially  diplo- 
macy which  attempts  to  make  good  a  deficiency  of  power  by  an 
excess  of  duplicity,  for  this  type  of  craftiness  ends  in  contempt. 
Diplomacy  in  its  turn  is  spurred  on  by  national  ambitions  which, 
in  a  wealthy  nation,  are  many  and  complex.  These,  even  though 
unsupported  by  power,  breed  among  the  ignorant  masses  a 
valour  based  on  the  ignorance  of  the  requirements  of  war  and, 
frequently,  force  diplomacy  to  offer  veiled  or  open  threats, 
though  the  diplomatists  themselves  fully  realize  that  this  process 
can  only  succeed  through  bluff,  and  if  their  opponent  pays  to  see 
the  hand,  seeing  it  he  will  laugh  and  most  certainly  take  the 
pool.  A  nation,  even  more  so  than  an  individual,  is  sensitive 
to  ridicule,  for  the  masses  possess  little  wit,  and  it  is  ridicule, 
in  its  various  simple  and  complex  forms,  which  is  a  sure  irritant 
of  war. 

As  the  first  is  due  to  a  lack  in  the  equilibration  of  power 
between  two  or  more  nations,  so  is  the  second  due  to  the  existence 
of  a  hiatus  between  the  mentalities  of  the  nation  and  its  army. 
National  progress  seldom  can  be  stayed  even  by  the  will  of  the 
majority,  because,  on  account  of  competition,  an  evolution  of 
the  old  hunting  spirit,  the  minority,  by  compulsion  the  thinking 
(more  crafty)  section  of  the  community,  can  seldom  be  brought 
to  concentrate  wilfully  on  its  own  destruction.  Its  tendency, 
anyhow,  is  to  live  and  not  to  die.  It  frequently  arises,  however, 
especially  in  prosperous  nations,  that  the  national  will  to  hunt 
for  wealth  is  so  great  that  it  monopolizes  all  their  efforts,  and, 
consequently,  that  little  thought  is  given  to  the  maintenance 
and  protection  of  their  wealth  through  military  action.  In 
these  circumstances,  an  army,  which  should  be  of  the  nation, 
becomes  separated  from  it.  It  develops  into  a  caste,  and,  being 
neither  looked  upon  with  affection  nor  cared  for,  it  loses  pace 
in  the  race  of  national  progress  and  becomes  barbaric  by  growing 
out  of  date.  Then,  when  diplomacy  fails,  and  the  national 
equilibrium  is  upset  by  insult  or  ridicule,  the  nation,  which  is 


12  The  Reformation  of  War 

ever  a  heterogeneous  crowd  swayed  by  its  primitive  instincts, 
receives  its  impulse  from  its  army  and  its  military  leaders  ; 
this  impulse  being  mainly  subconscious.  Reacting  by  suggestion 
on  the  crowd  mind,  it  detonates  war  even  before  the  nation  is 
prepared  to  accept  it,  and  the  result  is,  frequently,  a  disaster. 

A  barbaric  army,  that  is,  one  separated  in  intellect  from  the 
nation  to  which  it  belongs,  is  an  incentive  to  war  without  being 
an  efficient  weapon  wherewith  to  wage  it.  Civilization  cannot 
safely  progress  under  the  protection  of  such  a  force ;  consequently, 
all  that  goes  to  build  up  the  mentality  of  a  nation  must  go  to 
build  up  the  mentality  of  its  army.  These  two  must  be  one  in 
mind,  one  in  soul  and  one  in  body,  though  this  does  not  necessarily 
mean  that  the  whole  nation  must  consist  of  drilled  soldiers,  but 
that  the  soldiers  and  civilians,  in  thought  and  progress,  are 
living  in  one  camp. 

The  pathology  of  war  may  be  traced  to  a  decay  in  or  retard- 
ation of  the  mystic  impulses  which,  springing  from  the  instinct 
of  self-preservation,  control  the  destinies  of  nations.  The  true 
might  of  a  nation  is  to  be  sought  for  not  so  much  in  the  strength 
or  perfection  of  its  army,  which  is  but  the  means  of  materializing 
this  might,  but  in  the  health  of  its  spirit,  that  is  its  will  to  preserve 
itself  from  dangers  internal  and  external.  This  spirit  or  vitality, 
so  necessary  to  its  existence,  finds  its  outlet  through  the  two 
primitive  instincts  of  hunting  and  breeding.  Hunting  evolves 
into  the  pursuit  of  commerce,  which,  when  stabilized  in  a  civilized 
State,  becomes  labour  without  excitement.  The  natural  plea- 
sures of  life  are  denied,  cramped  and  crushed,  day  in  and  day  out, 
by  a  monotonous  routine.  The  stimulus  of  the  hunt  being  absent, 
the  body  becomes  lethargic  and  the  mind  dulled  by  a  grim 
monotony.  When  such  a  state  eclipses  the  soul  of  a  nation, 
the  primitive  instincts  gather  in  stormy  clouds.  Then  man's 
mind  broods  and  is  filled  with  the  gloom  of  discontent ;  he 
becomes  nomadic  in  spirit,  the  old  desire  of  the  forests  and 
the  jungle  is  awakened  in  his  soul,  it  flames  forth  like  some 
subtle  lightning,  and  there  is  war.  The  pent-up  instincts  have 
flashed  forth,  man  is  once  again  the  healthy  heathen,  the  roamer 


The  Origins  of  War  13 

over  the  mountains  and  the  reveller  in  the  mists.  The  intoxi- 
cation of  the  chase  is  upon  him,  the  instincts  of  millions  of  years 
are  unleashed.  He  is  freed  for  a  space  from  the  fear  of  death. 
Now  for  the  nation  is  there  glory  in  death,  in  self-sacrifice  and 
renunciation,  as  there  was  once  glory  for  man  in  risking  his  life 
in  the  winning  of  his  mate  and  in  the  protection  of  his  family 
and  his  lair. 

To  reduce  life  to  a  gt  Dmetric  figure,  with  its  Euclidian  laws, 
its  parallels  which  never  meet  and  its  mathematical  lines  and 
points,  is  not  only  to  suppose  that  life  is  an  inert  substance, 
but  that  humanity  is  governed  by  reason,  which  it  most  certainly 
is  not.  For,  if  it  be  the  exception  rather  than  the  rule  for  any 
two  rational  individuals  to  agree  on  any  one  argument,  how 
much  more  so  is  not  this  the  case  when  opinions  are  being  dis- 
cussed collectively  ?  Reason  is  indeed  a  potent  faculty  of  the 
mind,  but  it  is  only  one  of  a  number  of  potent  faculties,  all  of 
which  ultimately  are  swayed  by  the  primitive  instincts.  Further, 
it  is  the  first  to  volatilize  directly  the  stimulus  of  fear  is  applied 
to  the  sympathetic  minds  of  a  crowd  of  persons. 

The  more  geometric  the  life  of  a  nation  becomes,  the  more 
are  its  instincts  and  desires  pent  up,  and  the  more  do  they  attempt 
to  find  some  outlet  for  their  vigour.  During  the  Middle  Ages 
the  greater  part  of  Europe  was  shrouded  under  a  religious  pall, 
and  the  horror  of  the  static  state  rested  on  the  Western  World 
like  a  huge  coffin  lid.  Had  not  crime  and  cruelty  given  an  outlet 
to  man's  natural  appetites,  the  world  would  have  gone  mad ; 
as  it  was,  it  was  half  insane  ;  and  only  war  and  brutality  prevented 
it  becoming  totally  so.  To-day,  we  possess  religious  freedom, 
yet  democracy,  the  new  cult,  is  fast  foisting  on  to  us  a  static 
organization.  The  State  is  replacing  the  Church,  and  State 
domination  must  end  in  geometricity  of  thought  and  action, 
the  enslavement  of  the  individual  and  the  charging  of  the  Leyden 
cells  of  war.  There  can  be  nothing  more  appalling  to  the  philo- 
sopher than  to  watch  the  doctrines  of  those  with  universal 
brotherhood  on  their  lips,  percolating  through  society  like  water 
through  a  rock,  when  it  is  apparent,  by  universal  inference,  that 


14  The  Reformation  of  War 

these  doctrines  will  one  day  solidify  and  break  the  nations 
saturated  with  them  into  a  thousand  fragments. 

To  restrict  the  ravages  of  the  worst  of  all  wars,  namely, 
civil  war,  which  is  a  crime  against  Nature,  since  in  place  of  pre- 
serving national  existence  it  destroys  it,  there  is  implanted  in 
the  heart  of  man  an  impulse  which  directs  the  energies  of  all 
progressive  nations  externally  against  those  which  surround 
them.  This  impulse  is  the  first  cause  of  organized  wars  ;  it  is 
the  instinct  of  self-preservation  seeking  security  by  establishing 
unattackable  frontiers.  In  primitive  times  a  tribe  could  only 
feel  secure  when  the  tribes  surrounding  it  were  less  powerful 
than  itself  ;  if  equally  powerful,  then  warfare  was  incessant 
until  the  strongest  gained  inter-tribal  supremacy.  To-day  it 
is  much  the  same,  strong  nations  cannot  tolerate  strong  nations 
as  neighbours,  and  are  only  deterred  from  attacking  them  if 
the  balance  of  international  power  is  against  them.  Their 
impulse  of  self-preservation  bids  them  extend  their  frontiers 
to  impassable  or  easily  defensible  obstacles,  or  else  to  nations 
so  inferior  in  military  strength  to  their  own,  that  they  have 
nothing  to  fear.  In  the  case  of  England,  in  spite  of  her  secure 
frontiers — the  sea,  this  impulse  is  constantly  active.  Her 
history  is  free  from  serious  revolutions,  because  the  hunting 
spirit  of  her  people  expended  itself  in  adventure,  such  as  that 
which  led  Drake  around  the  globe.  Cromwell,  though  the  child 
of  revolution,  in  his  wisdom  so  completely  directed  this  spirit 
externally  that  no  revolution  of  a  serious  character  has  since 
his  day  occurred  in  England.  For  self-preservation,  England's 
frontiers  are  the  sea  coasts  of  other  nations,  and,  when  land 
frontiers  are  impossible  to  avoid,  she  has  nearly  always  attempted 
to  protect  them  by  the  creation  or  maintenance  of  weak  buffer 
States. 

The  second  great  cause  of  war  is  in  nature  economic.  In 
primitive  times,  pillage,  or  the  killing  of  one  man  by  another 
for  personal  gain  was  a  common  act.  As  civilization  advances, 
this  personal  act  is  replaced  by  a  tribal  or  racial  act  of  war. 
A  tribe  is  killed  off  and  its  belongings  taken,  and,  if  its  land  be 


The  Origins  of  War  15 

annexed  or  occupied,  in  nature,  such  a  war  becomes  organized, 
since  permanent  garrisons  are  created.  Thus  far  the  natural 
history  of  the  primitive  form  of  war,  evolving  into  the  organized, 
is  simple.  Not  so,  however,  its  evolution  through  the  psycholo- 
gical channels.  To  steal  a  man's  meat  undoubtedly  calls,  in 
a  primitive  people,  for  vengeance  ;  so  also  does  any  detraction 
from  a  man's  prowess,  for  it  lowers  him  in  the  eyes  of  his  family 
and  so  attacks  him  psychologically  by  wounding  his  vanity. 
To  degrade  a  neighbouring  tribe  to  serfdom  or  slavery  is  to  attack 
it  psychologically  on  wholesale  lines.  If  the  tribe  be  effete,  it 
will  probably  die  out ;  if  virile,  it  will  probably  rebel  and  attempt 
to  purge  itself  of  its  masters  and  so  regain  its  former  freedom. 
The  same  applies  to  the  enslavement  of  nations,  and  in  order  to 
obviate  such  a  catastrophe,  nations  raise  armies  to  protect 
them  against  so  oppressive  a  fate. 

As  a  war  of  vengeance  generally  originates  from  a  war  of 
pillage,  so  does  a  war  of  purgation  normally  arise  from  an  act  of 
conquest,  and  conquest,  in  its  modern  sense,  may  be  viewed 
under  three  economic  headings. 

(i.)  The  conquest  of  land  in  order  to  obtain  raw  material. 

(ii.)  The  conquest  of  man-power  in  order  to  manufacture 
commodities. 

(hi.)  The  conquest  of  free  markets  in  order  to  sell  commo- 
dities. 

All  three  of  these  types  of  conquest  may  be  accomplished 
without  the  clash  of  steel,  just  as  the  enslavement  of  a  weak  tribe 
by  a  strong  may  be  accomplished  by  fear  or  by  a  moral  threat. 
But,  if  the  original  owners  of  the  land,  the  man-power  enslaved,  or 
the  possessors  of  the  markets,  are  virile,  bloodless  though  these 
conquests  may  be,  they  frequently  lead  to  the  most  bloody  of 
wars  of-  purgation,  because  conquest  generally  carries  with  it  a 
restriction  of  the  primitive  hunting  instinct  in  the  conquered. 

From  the  national  standpoint,  a  war  of  conquest  has  nothing 
whatever  to  do  with  right  or  wrong,  for  Nature  knows  nothing  of 
morality,  unless  morality  be  defined  as  race  survival.     Efficient 


16  The  Reformation  of  War 

races  conquer  and  enjoy  their  conquests,  just  as  efficient  hunters 
kill  and  enjoy  their  prey.  So  also  are  effete  races  conquered,  and, 
should  they  be  eaten  up,  they  deserve  their  fate.  If  they  can, 
however,  overthrow  their  conquerers  then  equally  do  they  deserve 
their  liberation.  A  race  which  submits  to  slavery  is  a  race  the 
virility  of  which  has  grown  sterile.  Nature  abhors  a  mental 
eunuch  as  fervently  as  she  abhors  a  physical  vacuum. 

Great  nations  are  born  in  war,  because  war  is  the  focal-point 
of  national  concentration  ;  great  nations  decay  in  peace,  because 
peace  is  the  circumference  of  the  circle  the  centre  of  which  is  this 
focal-point — the  greater  the  diameter  or  time  the  greater  the 
danger  resulting. 

From  the  material  aspect  of  war,  chiefly  through  the  sexual 
instinct,  is  evolved  a  nebulous  and  later  on  a  fixed  psychological 
character.  Man  has  to  win  his  mate  by  being  the  strongest  of  his 
sex  ;  should  his  strength  fail  him,  he  must  resort  to  craft,  which  is 
synonymous  to  insulting  the  strength  or  abilities  of  his  opponent 
by  taking  what  might  to-day  be  called  a  mean  advantage  of 
him.  He  lurks  in  the  bushes  or  in  the  shadows  of  night  and  assas- 
sinates, rather  than  fights  his  competitor.  Such  a  type  of  attack, 
from  the  physiological  standpoint  of  the  survival  of  the  fittest,  is 
revolting  to  the  strong,  and  it  must  be  remembered  that  it  is  the 
physiological  aspect  of  war  which  is  always  the  most  prominent 
in  man's  mind.  Such  an  act  as  this  is  "  unsportsmanlike,"  it  is 
comparable  to  shooting  a  fox  in  a  hunting  county,  or  attacking  a 
lion  with  a  machine-gun  in  a  game  preserve.  It  cries  for  ven- 
geance, for,  if  it  succeed,  there  will  be  scant  protection  for  the 
offspring  of  even  the  strongest.  From  the  wars  of  muscle  against 
muscle  is  thus  evolved  the  war  of  brain  against  brain,  in  the  form 
of  personal  vengeance.  The  antagonist  is  not  killed  for  his  be- 
longings, but  in  order  to  get  rid  of  him  as  an  individual  and  later 
on  as  a  public  nuisance.  Vengeance  grows  into  morality,  which 
may  be  defined  as  :  that  state  of  existence  which  best  enables 
the  individuals  composing  society  to  live  peacefully  together. 
Morality  is  not  an  instinct  but  a  compromise  ;  from  it  evolves 
legislation,  which  metes  out  punishment  to  those  who  injure 


The  Origins  of  War  17 

peaceful  race  survival.  As  politics  are  dependent  on  the  will  of 
the  majority,  a  will  which  is  never  for  long  stable,  to  endeavour 
to  establish  an  international  code  of  laws  on  a  footing  similar  to 
that  of  national  legal  codes  is  to  attempt  the  impossible,  for  with- 
out political  power  the  legislation  of  politically  irresponsible 
courts  is  valueless  ;  for  political  power  is  based  on  the  will  of  the 
majority  of  a  nation,  which,  in  its  turn,  is  governed  by  the  in- 
stinct of  national  preservation. 

The  evolution  of  wars  of  vengeance  is  exceedingly  intricate. 
First,  they  are  pursued  to  avenge  personal  injury,  the  theft  of 
another  man's  belongings — his  flint  arrow-heads  or  his  wife. 
Secondly,  to  avenge  the  theft  of  his  sentiments — slander  against 
his  person  or  the  deprivation  of  the  affection  of  some  woman. 
As  such,  wars  of  vengeance  are  as  common  to-day  as  50,000 
years  ago.  Thirdly,  they  develop  into  protecting  the  race 
from  insult  and  depredation,  and,  when  races  depend  for  their 
existence  upon  commerce,  they  direct  their  efforts  against  dis- 
honest and  underhand  practices.  Fourthly,  they  develop  into 
avenging  insults  directed  against  the  political  and  religious 
systems  of  nations,  and  here  we  find  vengeance  based  on  a  multi- 
tude of  capricious  ideas.  The  Arian  schism  hinged  on  the  word 
"  Homoousios,"  and  a  war  between  England  and  Spain,  in  1739, 
on  the  severance  of  an  ear.  These  pretexts  cannot  be  considered 
as  real  causes  of  war,  but  rather  as  the  detonators  of  the  pent-up 
hunting  instinct  in  man  which  has  been  tamped  down  by  arti- 
fice. Society  may  be  likened  to  a  permanent  powder  magazine 
formed  of  innumerable  sentiments.  When  these  are  scattered 
and  far  spaced,  the  danger  of  explosion  is  small,  but  when  con- 
centrated one  spark  may  lift  the  roof  off  a  generation. 

In  all  these  phases  of  war,  wrhether  slow-  and  internal  or 
rapid  and  external,  whether  directed  against  individuals  or 
nations,  whether  military  or  commercial,  the  sum  total  of  horror 
is  purely  relative  to  the  state  of  the  sentiments  of  the  day — they 
are  dynamite  or  crude  black  powder  !  Thus  a  war,  to-day, 
between  the  Americans  and  Japanese,  waged  in  order  to  obtain 
human  flesh  for  food,  would  freeze  the  blood  in  the  heart  of  every 

2 


18  The  Reformation  of  War 

European  outside  Russia,  even  if  it  resulted  in  only  a  few  dozen 
people  being  eaten.  After  prolonged  periods  of  absence  from  a 
certain  condition,  its  occurrence  becomes  a  novelty,  a  new 
creation  which  appals  the  inert  mind.  Such  minds  can  find  no 
comparison  wherewith  to  measure  the  cataclysm,  though,  if  these 
minds  were  by  nature  introspective,  they  would  realize  that,  as 
science  has  ameliorated  the  conditions  of  peace,  so  equally  can 
science  ameliorate  the  manners  of  war. 

In  war,  novelties  of  an  atavistic  nature  are  generally  horrible ; 
nevertheless,  in  the  public  mind,  their  novelty  is  their  crime  ; 
consequently,  when  novelties  of  a  progressive  character  are  in- 
troduced on  the  battlefield,  the  public  mind  immediately  anathe- 
matizes them,  not  necessarily  because  they  are  horrible  but  be- 
cause they  are  new.  Nothing  insults  a  human  being  more  than 
an  idea  his  brains  are  incapable  of  creating.  Such  ideas  detract 
from  his  dignity  for  they  belittle  his  understanding.  In  April, 
1915,  a  few  hundred  British  and  French  soldiers  were  gassed  to 
death  ;  gas  being  a  novelty,  Europe  was  transfixed  with  horror. 
In  the  winter  of  1918-1919,  the  influenza  scourge  accounted  for 
over  10,000,000  deaths,  more  than  the  total  casualties  in  killed 
throughout  the  whole  of  the  Great  War  ;  yet  the  world  scarcely 
twitched  an  eyelid,  though  a  few  people  went  so  far  as  to  sniff 
eucalyptus. 

One  of  the  main  arguments  against  armies  is  their  futility  ; 
but,  if  this  be  true,  this  argument  can  with  equal  force  be 
directed  against  peaceful  organizations  ;  for  surely  it  is  just  as 
futile  to  keep  vast  numbers  of  a  nation  on  the  brink  of  starvation 
and  prostitution,  as  happens  in  nearly  all  civilized  countries 
to-day,  as  it  is  to  keep  an  insignificant  minority  of  this  same  nation 
on  the  brink  of  war. 

Human  nature,  fortunately,  is  not  changed  by  wild  illogical 
statements  or  even  by  logical  comparisons.  Petronius  Arbiter, 
eighteen  hundred  years  ago,  wrote  in  his  Satyricon  : 

"  As  for  Trimalchio,  he  has  as  much  land  as  a  kite  can  fly  over, 
he  has  heaps  upon  heaps  of  money.  There  is  more  silver  lying  in 
his  porter's  lodge  than  another  man's  whole  estate  is  worth.     And, 


The  Origins  of  War  19 

as  for  slaves,  wheugh  !  by  Hercules,  I  do  not  believe  one  tenth  of 
them  know  their  own  master." 

Substitute  factory  hands  for  slaves,  and  the  Rome  of  Nero  is 
not  very  different  from  the  England  of  Tennyson  : 

"  Peace  sitting  under  her  olive,  and  slurring  the  days  gone  by, 
When  the  poor  are  hovell'd  and  hustled  together  each  sex,  like  swine  : 
When  only  the  ledger  lives,  and  when  only  not  all  men  lie ; 
Peace  in  her  vineyard — yes  !    but  a  company  forges  the  wine." 

This,  say  you,  has  all  been  changed,  democracy  has  to-day 
unhovelled  the  multitudes,  and  Socialism  is  offering  to  the  world 
a  new  and  beautiful  future.  This  future  is,  however,  nothing 
more  than  a  mirage  of  the  past — material  gain  and  greed,  eagerly 
grasped  at  by  the  hungry.     I  will  quote  again  : 

'  Why  do  we  prate  of  the  blessings  of  Peace  ?     We  have  made  them  a 

curse  ; 
Pick  pockets,  each  hand  lusting  for  all  that  is  not  its  own  ; 
And  lust  of  gain,  in  the  spirit  of  Cain,  is  it  better  or  worse 
Than  the  heart  of  the  citizen  hissing  in  war  on  his  own  hearthstone  ? 
But  these  are  the  days  of  advance,  the  works  of  the  men  of  mind, 
When  who  but  a  fool  would  have  faith  in  a  tradesman's  ware  or  his 

word  ? 
Is  it  peace  or  war  ?     Civil  war,  as  I  think,  and  that  of  a  kind 
The  viler,  as  underhand,  not  openly  bearing  the  sword." 

In  spite  of  the  shrieking  peace-mongers,  the  fact  is  that  the 
state  of  peace  is  the  state  of  war,  and  the  horror  of  peace  is  the 
horror  of  war  ;  this  may  not  be  rational,  but  it  is,  nevertheless, 
true,  true  even  if  history  be  only  but  an  indifferent  witness.  It 
is  here  that  we  merge  into  the  purgative  character  of  wars  of 
vengeance — fevers  begotten  by  communistic  social  rule,  which 
restricts  the  outlet  of  man's  natural  appetites.  Wars  of  revolu- 
tion are  caused  by  despotism,  the  worst  form  of  which  is  com- 
munism, not  only  the  communism  of  the  gutter  but  the  com- 
munism of  bureaucratic  government.  All  men  are  proclaimed 
or  treated  as  equal,  the  law  of  the  survival  of  the  fittest  is  ab- 
rogated in  a  mist  of  words  and  in  a  flow  of  ink  ;  the  struggle  for 
existence  is  abolished,  and  the  immediate  result  is  that  it  asserts 
itself  in  its  most  brutal  forms.     Sentiments  group  themselves  and 

2* 


20  The  Reformation  of  War 

concentrate,  and  the  magazine  of  society  becomes  sensitive  to 
combustion  at  the  slightest  moral  shock. 

Philosophically,  there  can  be  no  end  to  war  as  long  as  there  is 
life  or  motion,  for  the  very  elements  struggle  in  ceaseless  combina- 
tions and,  as  far  as  we  can  at  present  judge,  will  continue  to 
struggle  until  the  crack  of  doom.  The  greatest  world-war  which 
our  globe  ever  experienced  was  a  bloodless  one  ;  it  occurred 
millions  of  centuries  ago,  when  the  earth,  then  an  incandescent 
cloud  of  gas,  tore  itself  away  from  the  sun  its  mother  and  with 
flaming  caul  proclaimed  its  identhvy.  From  this  great  war  all 
others  have  originated  and  will  continue  to  evolve  progressively, 
ever  tending  towards  some  unknown  goal. 

Modern  wars  are,  in  the  main,  progressive  in  nature,  for  they 
sweep  aside  obsolete  laws  and  customs  which  have  lost  their 
meaning  and  spur  men  awake  to  the  realities  of  life,  so  that  they 
may  cease  for  awhile  dreaming  of  life's  little  troubles.  To  pro- 
hibit wars  of  conquest,  if  such  a  prohibition  were  possible,  and  to 
permit  wars  of  purgation  would  end  in  a  universal  catastrophe. 
If  rigidly  adhered  to,  such  a  policy  would  lead  to  complete  isola- 
tion of  each  separate  nation,  to  an  end  of  commerce  and  an  end  to 
the  exchange  of  ideas.  Such  a  state  is  inconceivable,  and  human 
wars,  it  is  thought,  as  the  Buddhists  proclaim  of  sorrow,  can  only 
cease  with  a  cessation  of  desire. 

Henry  Maudslej^,  the  eminent  psychologist,  accentuates  this 
very  clearly  in  this  book  "  The  Pathology  of  Mind,"  when  he 
writes : 

"  Have  not  nations  owed  their  formation  as  much  to  brotherly 
hate  as  to  brotherly  love — more  perhaps  to  the  welding  consolida- 
tion enforced  by  the  pressure  of  hostile  peoples  than  to  the  attractive 
forces  of  their  components  ?  And  what  is  the  spur  of  commerce 
but  competition  ?  War  in  one  shape  or  another,  open  or  disguised, 
has  plainly  been  the  divinely  appointed  instrument  of  human  progress, 
carnage  the  immoral-seeming  means  by  which  the  slow  incarnation 
of  morality  in  mankind  has  been  effected. 

When  we  look  at  facts  sincerely  as  they  are,  not  satisfied  to  rest 
in  a  void  of  speculative  idealism  and  insincerity,  we  perceive  that 
in  every  department  of  life  the  superior  person  uses  his  superior 
powers   to   the   inevitable    detriment   of  the  inferior  person,   even 


The  Origins  of  War  21 

though  he  may  afterwards  dispense  benevolently  out  of  his  super- 
fluity to  some  of  those  who  fall  by  the  wayside.  The  moral  law 
only  works  successfully  as  a  mean  between  two  extremes,  excess 
of  either  being  alike  fatal.  He  who  aspires  to  love  his  neighbour 
as  himself  must  at  the  same  time  take  care  to  love  himself  as  his 
neighbour,  making  himself  his  neighbour  while  he  makes  his  neigh- 
bour himself ;  his  right  duty  being  to  cultivate  not  a  suicidal  self- 
sacrifice  which  would  be  a  crime  against  self,  but  just  that  self- 
sacrifice  which  is  the  wisest  self-interest  and  just  that  self-interest 
which  is  the  wisest  self-sacrifice.  So  he  obtains  the  utmost  develop- 
ment of  self  within  the  limits  of  the  good  of  the  whole.  He  will 
not  go  very  far  in  morality  if  he  compound  for  lack  of  self-renuncia- 
tion on  his  part  by  a  special  indulgence  of  his  own  self-love  in 
dictating  sacrifices  to  other  people.  Were  men  to  carry  the  moral 
law  of  self-sacrifice  into  rigorous  and  extreme  effect  they  would 
perish  by  the  practice  of  their  virtues.  When  they  had  succeeded 
in  eradicating  competition,  in  making  an  equal  distribution  of 
wealth,  in  prolonging  the  feeblest  life  to  its  utmost  tether,  in  banish- 
ing strife  and  war  from  the  earth,  in  bringing  all  people  on  it  to  so 
sheep-like  a  placidity  of  nature  that  they  would  no  more  hurt  and 
destroy,  and  to  such  an  ant-like  uniformity  of  industrious  well- 
doing that  no  one  would  work  for  himself  but  every  one  for  all, 
they  would  have  robbed  human  nature  of  its  springs  of  enterprise 
and  reduced  it  to  a  stagnant  state  of  decadence.  A  millennium 
of  blessed  bees  or  industrious  ants  !  For  it  is  the  progress  of  desire 
and  the  struggle  to  attain  which  keeps  the  current  of  human  life 
moving  and  wholesome  alike  in  individuals,  in  societies,  and  in 
nations.  Not  to  go  forward  is  to  go  back,  and  not  to  move  at  all 
is  death." 

If  progress  be  rendered  impossible,  only  two  other  courses 
are  open  to  humanity  :  stagnation  or  retrogression.  The  first 
means  war,  as  we  know  it  to-day,  and  the  second,  war  as  it  was 
known  in  the  past.  Retrogression  can  only  lead  to  one  goal, 
the  goal  we  started  from,  a  sliding  back  into  the  brute,  in  which 
process  of  retirement  we  shall  have  to  pass  through  all  past 
phases  of  human  warfare  until,  naked  and  unarmed,  we  tear 
each  other  to  pieces  with  our  nails. 

To  weep  and  gnash  our  teeth  over  preparations  for  war, 
because  they  cost  so  much,  is  but  a  symptom  of  decadence. 
"  How  can  we  afford  these  ships  or  these  armies  ?  '  This  is 
the  whine  of  a  small  householder  and  not  the  cry  of  a  virile 
nation.     Neolithic  man  wept  similar  tears,  no  doubt,  over  his 


22  The  Reformation  of  War 

arrow-heads.  "  How  can  I  afford  all  these  days  chipping 
this  wretched  flint,  my  bod}'  aches  for  food  and  my  brood  is 
starving  ?  '  He  did  afford  those  days,  and  had  he  not  done 
so,  his  race  would  have  been  exterminated.  Nature  cares 
nothing  for  the  sweat  of  man's  brow  or  the  leanness  of  his  purse  ; 
nations  must,  therefore,  not  only  afford  to  survive  but  must 
will  to  do  so.  If  some  war  commodity  be  beyond  the  national 
means  or  the  national  powers  of  labour,  nations  must  not  cease 
in  their  efforts  or  rely  on  second-rate  weapons,  but,  instead, 
they  must  either  increase  their  powers  of  labour  or  substitute 
for  these  costly  weapons  cheaper  and  more  effective  ones.  The 
nations  which  can  accomplish  this  survive  ;  those  which  can- 
not— perish.  Nature  tolerates  no  unearned  rest  :  "  In  the 
sweat  of  thy  face  shall  thou  eat  bread,"  this  is  her  irrevocable 
dictum.  There  is  no  permanent  rest  for  humanity.  Forwards 
lie  the  pains  of  growth,  backwards  the  agony  of  decomposition. 
To  stand  still  is  to  rot.  The  Saurians  are  dead  and  gone,  yet 
the  little  ant  survives  and  multiplies. 

As  to  the  functions  of  the  State,  the  State  should  remain 
inert,  that  is  to  say  it  should  so  govern  a  nation  that  equal 
opportunity  for  the  evolution  of  all  creative  and  receptive 
brains  is  rendered  possible.  This  is  not  communism,  which  aims 
at  assisting  the  weak,  but  race  survival,  which  aims  at  assist- 
ing the  strongest  to  forge  ahead  through  the  agency  of 
a  virile  competition.  It  has  little  to  do  with  the  distribution 
of  wealth,  but  everything  to  do  with  the  Catholicism  of  health. 
Some  will  continue  to  be  born  rich  and  some  poor ;  nevertheless, 
it  should  be  a  national  point  of  honour  that  no  stone  be  left 
unturned  which  will  enable  all  to  be  born  strong,  and  to  be 
provided  with  equal  opportunities  of  education,  of  marriage 
and  of  law.  The  function  of  the  State  is  to  level  the  social 
tilting  ground  for  the  national  tourney  between  thought  and 
action  ;  to  see  that  for  either  side  it  is  free  from  pitfalls,  and 
that  there  is  no  hitting  below  the  belt.  As  long  as  the  State 
does  not  produce  this  condition  of  impartial  inertia,  so  long 
will  wars  of  purgation  arise  and  lead  to  wars  of  conquest.     When 


The  Origins  of  War  23 

all  States  do  produce  it,  as  unsentimentally  as  a  judge  adminis- 
ters justice,  then  indeed  may  collective  acts  of  brigandage 
become  as  infrequent  as  their  individual  counterparts.  Bellona 
will  not  have  ceased  to  be,  but  she  will  have  changed  her  com- 
plexion from  a  tawny  red  to  a  leprous  grey.  Battlefields  will 
become  bloodless,  and  the  agony  of  muscle  will  be  replaced  by 
the  agony  of  mind.  To  drive  a  nation  mad  may  then  quite 
possibly  be  considered  a  superb  victory.  Thus  does  civiliza- 
tion stride  forward  on  the  stepping  stones  of  death  and  madness 
towards  life  and  the  fullness  of  life,  until  her  path  is  lost  in  the 
gloom  of  an  inscrutable  future. 

Be  this  as  it  may,  "  the  will  to  live  "  is  the  ultimate  horizon 
of  her  philosophy.  Far  distant  ma}/  this  circumference  grow 
in  ever  increasing  circles,  but,  in  the  centre  of  these,  squats 
their  originator,  a  shadowy  form,  all  but  indiscernible  to  the 
philosopher,  totally  unseen  by  those  filled  with  windy  words  : 
the  form  of  primitive  man,  gorged  on  the  flesh  of  his  prey  and 
basking  in  the  sun. 


II 

THE   SCIENCE   AND   ART   OF  WAR 

HAVING  now  analysed  the  soul  of  war  and,  rightfy  or 
wrongly,  having  assumed  that  wars  in  one  form  or 
another  are  inevitable,  in  this  Chapter  I  will  examine  the  science 
and  art  of  the  mind  and  body  of  this  subject.  I  do  so  because, 
when  we  come  to  consider  the  future  tendencies  of  war,  not 
only  is  it  important  to  realize  that  future  warfare  must  be  an 
evolution  of  present  and  past  warfare,  but  that  all  forms  of  war- 
fare are  founded  on  a  common  science. 

From  a  cursory  study  of  military  history,  a  student  might 
well  be  deluded  into  believing  that  war  is  so  closely  related  to 
the  roulette  table  as  to  be  classed  as  a  veritable  game  of  chance. 
What  does  he  see  ?  The  efforts  of  many  noted  generals  who  have 
been  either  gamblers  pure  and  simple,  or  else  keen  but  inept 
dabblers  in  dark  sciences.  These,  he  soon  finds,  have  worked 
much  like  the  alchemists  of  the  Middle  Ages,  who  sought  for 
perpetual  motion,  the  universal  solvent,  the  philosopher's 
stone  and  the  elixir  of  life,  in  mixtures  compounded  of  dragon's 
blood,  grated  unicorn's  horn  and  the  marrow  of  consecrated 
cats. 

Even  in  the  Great  War  of  1914-1918  we  can  discover  few 
scientific  reasons  for  the  innumerable  actions  fought,  no  firmer 
basis  than  Marshal  Saxe  could  discover  in  his  day  when  he 
wrote  : 

"  War  is  a  science  so  obscure  and  imperfect  that,  in  general,  no 
rules  of  conduct  can  be  given  in  it  which  are  reducible  to  absolute 
certainties  ;  custom  and  prejudice,  confirmed  by  ignorance,  are  its 
sole  foundations  and  support." 

24 


The  Science  and  Art  of  War  25 

The  armies  of  1914  were  imitators  of  past  methods  of  war- 
fare, for  they  had  been  fed  on  past  battles.  Science  does  not 
imitate,  for  science  unravels  and  creates. 

What  is  science  ?  Science  is  co-ordinated  knowledge,  facts 
arranged  according  to  their  values,  or  to  put  it  more  briefly  still 
and  to  quote  Thomas  Huxley,  science  is  "  organized  common 
sense  .  .  .  the  rarest  of  all  the  senses." 

War  is  as  much  a  science  as  all  other  human  activities,  and, 
like  all  other  sciences,  it  is  built  upon  facts,  of  which  there  are 
an  innumerable  quantity.  From  these  facts  may  we  extract 
the  elements  of  war  and  the  principles  of  war  and  the  conditions 
of  war — the  circumstances  in  which  the  principles  must  be 
brought  to  govern  the  elements. 

What  is  the  simplest  possible  type  of  human  warfare  ?  A 
fight  between  two  unarmed  men.  What  is  their  object  ?  To 
impose  their  wills  upon  each  other.  How  do  they  accomplish 
this  ?  By  giving  blows  without  receiving  them  or  the  fewest 
possible  number.  In  these  words  have  we  completely  laid  bare 
the  essential  nature  of  the  fight,  in  fact  we  have  discovered 
the  pivotal  problem  in  the  science  of  war — the  destruction  of 
the  enemy's  strength  (physical  or  moral),  which  not  only  embraces 
his  army  but  the  whole  of  his  nation,  and  which  constitutes 
the  crucial  problem  in  the  art  of  war :  "  how  to  kill, 
disable,  or  capture  without  being  killed,  disabled,  or 
captured."* 

In  war  we  start  with  man,  the  author  of  all  human  strife. 
To  defeat  his  adversary  he  must  will  to  do  so,  he  must  move 
towards  him,  he  must  hit  him  and  he  must  prevent  himself 
from  being  hit,  or,  otherwise,  he  may  fail  to  impose  his  will, 
which  is  enforced  and  protected  by  his  actions. 

Man,  in  himself,  may  be  compared  to  the  ether,  out  of  which 
the  other  elements  are  evolved.  In  war  the  physical  elements 
arising  out  of  the  body  of  man  are  :  movement,  weapons  and 
protection. 

*  This  is  the  traditional  problem.  Later  on  I  will  show  that  for  body  should 
be  substituted  mind. 


26  The  Reformation  of  War 

Examining  movement  first,  we  and  that,  tactically,  there 
are  two  types :  protective  movements  and  offensive  move- 
ments ;  the  first  I  will  denote  by  the  term  "  approaches  "  and 
the  second  by  that  of  "  attacks."  In  the  former  the  one  thought 
of  the  soldier  is  "to  prevent  himself  from  being  hit,"  and,  in 
the  latter,  "  to  hit  his  enemy."  The  more  he  can  hit  the  less 
he  will  be  hit,  consequently,  indirectly  though  it  may  be,  not 
only  is  the  whole  action  protective  in  character,  but  it  becomes 
more  and  more  so  as  the  offensive  succeeds.  From  this  it  will  be 
at  once  seen  that  any  idea  of  thinking  of  the  offensive  and  the  de- 
fensive phases  of  war,  battle  or  duel,  as  things  in  themselves  apart, 
is  absurd ;  for  these  two  acts  form  the  halves  of  the  diameter 
of  the  tactical  circle,  the  circumference  of  which  is  the  fight. 
They  are,  in  fact,  the  positive  and  negative  poles  of  the  tactical 
magnet  called  battle. 

Of  weapons  there  are  two  types — hitting  and  hurling  wea- 
pons. The  first  I  will  call  "  shock  weapons,"  such  as  the  bayonet, 
lance  and  sword,  and  the  second  "  missile  weapons,"  such  as 
arrows,  bullets,  and  gas.  As  the  tactical  object  of  physical 
battle  is  to  destroy  the  enemy,  which  is  best  accomplished  by 
clinching  with  him,  the  infantryman's  offensive  weapon  is  the 
bayonet  and  his  bullet  is  his  defensive  weapon,  on  account  of 
its  ability  to  protect  the  advance  of  the  bayonet.  Thus,  we 
see  that,  whenever  two  weapons  of  unequal  range  of  action  are 
employed,  the  one  of  longer  range  is  always  the  defensive  weapon 
and  the  one  of  shorter  range  the  offensive  one,  and  even  if  three 
or  more  weapons  be  used,  this  holds  equally  good  for  all.  From 
this  appreciation  may  be  deduced  a  tactical  rule  of  the  highest 
importance :  In  all  circumstances  missile  weapons  must 
be  emplo}^ed  to  facilitate  or  ward  off  the  shock. 

Protection,  or  the  defensive,  has  little  to  do  with  holding 
positions  or  beating  back  attacks,  for  it  is  just  as  much  part 
and  parcel  of  every  forward  movement  as  of  every  holding 
or  retrograde  one.  I  have  alieady  pointed  out  how  the  bullet 
defends  the  bayonet  and  how  the  approach  secures  the  attack 
by  lessening  casualties  when  the  soldier  is  advancing  and  not 


The  Science  and  Art  of  War  27 

actually  using  his  weapons.  Both  these  forms  of  protection 
are  indirect,  that  is  to  say,  they  do  not  ward  off  blows  but  im- 
pede blows  from  being  delivered.  Besides  these  indirect  means 
of  protection,  which  include  the  use  of  camouflage  and  smoke 
clouds,  several  direct  means  have  frequently  been  employed, 
such  as  armour,  earthworks  and  fortifications.  Under  this 
heading,  to-day,  must  also  be  placed  the  anti-gas  respirator. 
Direct  protection  is  such  as  will  nullify  the  effect  of  blows. 
Mobile  direct  protection  is  generally  the  most  effective,  for  any 
change  in  location  necessitates  a  change  in  the  enemy's  tactical 
organization,  and  consequently  a  loss  of  time  for  destructive 
effect.  When,  as  in  a  tank  or  battleship,  mobile  direct  and 
indirect  protection  can  be  combined,  the  highest  form  of  security 
is  obtained  ;  this  fact  was  all  but  unrealized  in  the  last  great 
war,  though  a  study  of  the  art  of  war  in  the  Middle  Ages  will 
show  that  it  formed  the  tactical  backbone  of  the  combat  between 
armoured  knights. 

I  have  already  made  mention  of  the  fact  that  to  imitate 
is  not  necessarily  to  work  scientifically.  Science  extracts 
knowledge  from  the  unknown  by  applying  to  it  certain  laws 
which  universal  inference  has  established.  Thus  we  have 
the  laws  of  gravitation,  of  causation  and  of  evolution.  War 
has  also  its  laws  or  principles,  and  they  are  to  be  found  in  the 
duel  as  in  the  battle.  As  regards  these  principles  of  war  there 
has  been  much  discussion  of  an  unscientific  nature.  Before 
the  Great  War  of  1914-1918,  every  Field  Service  Regulations 
made  mention  of  principles  of  war  and  pointed  out  their  im- 
portance, but  did  not  name  them.  The  British  Field  Service 
Regulations  of  1914  stated  :  "  The  fundamental  principles  of 
war  are  neither  very  numerous  nor  in  themselves  very  abstruse," 
and  then  left  the  readers  in  complete  doubt  as  to  what  they 
were.  Some  twenty  years  ago  Marshal,  then  Lieut. -Colonel, 
Foch  wrote  a  learned  book  on  "  The  Principles  of  War,"  in  which 
he  mentioned  four,  and  then,  apparently  in  doubt  as  regards 
the  remainder,  placed  "  etc."  at  the  end  of  this  list. 

There  are  eight  principles  of  war,  and  they  constitute  the 


28  The  Reformation  of  War 

laws  of  every  scientifically  fought  boxing  match  as  of  every 
battle.     These  principles  are  : 

ist  Principle. — The  principle  of  the  objective. 
2nd  Principle. — The  principle  of  the  offensive. 
3rd  Principle. — The  principle  of  security. 
4th  Principle. — The  principle  of  concentration. 
5th  Principle. — The  principle  of  economy  of  force. 
6th  Principle. — The  principle  of  movement. 
7th  Principle. — The  principle  of  surprise. 
8th  Principle. — The  principle  of  co-operation. 

No  one  of  the  above  eight  principles  is  of  greater  value  than 
the  other.  No  plan  of  action  can  be  considered  perfect  unless 
all  are  in  harmony,  and  none  can  be  considered  in  harmony 
unless  weighed  against  the  conditions  which  govern  their  ap- 
plication. Seldom  can  a  perfect  plan  be  arrived  at  because 
the  fog  of  war  seldom,  if  ever,  completely  rises.  It  is,  however, 
an  undoubted  fact  that  the  general  who  places  his  trust  in  the 
principles  of  war,  and  who  trusts  in  them  the  more  strongly 
the  fog  of  war  thickens,  almost  inevitably  beats  the  general  who 
does  not. 

These  principles  are,  in  my  opinion,  of  such  importance,  being 
in  fact  the  governors  of  war,  that,  as  far  as  space  will  permit, 
I  will  consider  them  in  detail.  First,  then,  what  is  the  objective 
in  war  ? 

(i.)  The  Principle  of  the  Objective.  The  object  of  a  nation  is 
national  preservation,  which,  in  a  civilized  race,  may  be  defined 
as  honourable,  profitable  and  secure  existence.  Here  we  find 
three  sub-objectives,  an  ethical  objective,  an  economic  objective 
and  a  military  objective.  These  three  combined  I  will  call  the 
political  objective  or  policy  of  the  nation,  the  stability  of  which 
depends  on  the  will  of  the  people. 

In  modern  warfare  it  does  not  pay  to  outrage  the  sentiments 
of  the  day,  neither  does  it  pay  to  destroy  the  economic  resources 
of  the  enemy.  Consequently,  when  all  peaceful  methods  of 
settlement  have  broken  down  and  a  nation  is  reduced  to  military 


The  Science  and  Art  of  War  29 

action  in  order  to  maintain  or  enforce  its  policy,  its  object  should 
be  to  impose  its  will  with  the  least  possible  ethical  and  economic 
loss  not  only  to  itself  but  to  its  enemies  and  to  the  world  at 
large.  A  nation  which  wins  a  war  through  foul  play  degrades 
itself  in  the  eyes  of  other  nations  and  loses  the  trust  of  the  world. 
A  nation  which  destroys  the  economic  resources  of  its  enemy, 
destroys  its  eventual  markets,  and  thus  wounds  itself.*  War 
must  entail  some  loss,  but  the  less  this  loss  is  the  greater  will 
be  the  victory ;  consequently,  the  military  object  of  a  nation  is 
not  to  kill  and  destroy,  but  to  enforce  the  policy  of  its  government 
with  the  least  possible  loss  of  honour,  life  and  property.  If  the 
enemy  can  be  compelled  to  accept  the  hostile  policy  without 
battle,  so  much  the  better.  If  he  opposes  it  by  military  force, 
then  it  should  never  be  forgotten  that  the  strength  of  this  force 
rests  on  the  will  of  the  government  which  employs  it,  and  that, 
in  its  turn,  this  will  rests  on  the  will  of  the  nation  which  this 
government  represents.  If  the  will  of  the  nation  cannot  directly 
be  attacked,  then  must  the  will  of  the  army  protecting  it  be 
broken.  In  the  past  this  will  has  been  attacked  by  attacking 
the  flesh  of  soldiers,  and,  so  consistent  has  this  been,  that  the 
idea  has  arisen  that  the  military  object  of  war  is  to  kill  and  to 
destroy.  Thus,  in  the  popular  and  military  imaginations,  the 
means  have  obscured  the  end ;  consequently,  the  prevailing 
idea  of  all  parties  in  the  recent  war  was  destruction,  to  destroy 
each  other,  and  so  blinded  were  they  by  the  means  that  they 
could  not  see  that  in  the  very  act  they  were  destroying  themselves, 
not  only  during  the  war  but  in  the  peace  which  must  some  day 
follow  the  war. 

I  believe  that  the  world  is  slowly  learning  this  lesson,  and 
that,  as  in  my  opinion  wars  are  inevitable,  the  old  idea  of  warfare 
based  on  destruction  will  be  replaced  by  a  new  military  ideal,  the 
imposition  of  will  at  the  least  possible  general  loss.  If  this  be 

*  It  is  true  that  a  self-supporting  nation  does  not  suffer  in  proportion 
to  one  not  self-contained,  but  it  must  be  realized  that  ecomomics  and  ethics 
are  closely  related,  and,  even  if  destruction  does  not  economically  affect  the 
destroyer,  the  ethical  repercussion  resulting  through  the  bankruptcy  of  the 
victim  is  very  likely  to  wound  him  morally. 


30  The  Reformation  of  War 

so,  then  the  means  of  warfare  must  be  changed,  for  the  present 
means  are  means  of  killing,  means  of  blood ;  they  must  be  replaced 
by  terrifying  means,  means  of  mind.  The  present  implements 
of  war  must  be  scrapped  and  these  bloody  tools  must  be  replaced 
by  weapons  the  moral  effect  of  which  is  so  terrific  that  a  nation 
attacked  by  them  will  lose  its  mental  balance  and  will  compel 
its  government  to  accept  the  hostile  policy  without  further  demur. 
In  this  book  I  will  show  the  probable  nature  of  the  first  stage 
in  this  new  evolution  of  war  ;  meanwhile,  I  will  examine  war 
from  the  present  military  aspect. 

In  organized  warfare,  if  the  objective  cannot  be  gained  by 
political  action,  recourse  is  made  to  force,  the  military  objective 
being  the  defeat  of  the  enemy's  military  strength  so  that  his 
national  policy  may  be  transmuted.  This  objective  is  attained 
by  a  harmonious  employment  of  the  remaining  seven  principles 
of  war.  Without  a  definite  objective  there  can  be  no  definite 
military  policy  or  plan,  and  without  a  policy  or  plan,  actions 
cannot  be  co-ordinated ;  consequently,  the  principle  of  the  objective 
may  also  be  considered  as  the  principle  of  co-ordination,  for,  as 
Napoleon  once  said  :  "  There  are  many  good  generals  in  Europe, 
but  they  see  too  many  things  at  once.  I  see  the  enemy's  masses 
and  I  destroy  them."  By  this  appreciation  of  the  objective 
all  his  movements  were  controlled. 

According  to  the  objective  depends  the  direction  taken  by  an 
army,  and  on  its  direction  depends  its  supply.  The  enemy 
is  at  A,  we  are  at  B.  Does  the  line  joining  these  two  points 
give  us  our  direction  ?  Yes  and  no  !  Yes,  if  the  seven  remaining 
principles  are  not  adversely  affected  by  our  moving  in  this 
direction,  and  if  the  conditions  permit  of  us  doing  so.  No,  if 
otherwise.  We  should  not,  however,  discard  this  direction  off- 
hand, even  if  we  find  that  some  of  the  principles  are  difficult 
to  apply  ;  instead  we  should  test  each  possible  line  of  advance 
until  we  arrive  at  the  line  of  least  resistance,  bearing  in 
mind  that  the  principle  of  the  objective  aims  at  creating  such 
a  situation  as  will  force  the  enemy  to  accept  the  policy  he  is 
fighting  against. 


The  Science  and  Art  of  War  31 

(ii.)  The  Principle  of  the  Offensive.  Will  the  objective  that 
we  have  selected  enable  us  to  apply  the  principle  of  the  offensive  ? 
If  it  will  not,  then  the  objective  selected  must  be  discarded,  for 
the  offensive  in  war  is  the  surest  road  to  success.  If  it  will,  then 
in  which  direction  should  the  offensive  be  made  ?  The  answer 
to  this  question  depends  on  the  conditions  of  war  (existing  and 
probable  circumstances),  which  should  be  looked  upon  as  the 
correctors  of  all  military  movements. 

Thus,  if  time  be  against  us,  time  in  which  an  enemy  can  mass 
his  reserves  to  meet  our  offensive  and  so  outwit  us,  the  offensive 
becomes  futile  or  dangerous  ;  unless,  possessing  more  men  than 
brains,  our  object  is  simply  to  kill  as  many  of  the  enemy  as 
we  can,  regardless  of  cost,  which  is  not  only  a  violation  of  the 
principle  of  economy  of  force,  but  the  poorest  of  poor  generalship. 
A  private  soldier  thinks  in  terms  of  killing  men,  but  a  general 
should  think  in  terms  of  disorganizing  and  demoralizing,  that 
is  of  defeating  armies.  "Push  of  pikes"  is  a  simple  game 
compared  to  defeating  an  army,  which  requires  an  acuter  intellect 
than  that  of  a  lusty  halberdier. 

Seldom  will  it  be  possible  to  march  straight  towards  the 
enemy's  main  force  in  order  to  defeat  it.  Its  whereabouts 
may  be  unknown,  but,  even  so,  the  ultimate  objective — dis- 
organization and  demoralization,  remains  constant.  Con- 
sequently, though  many  acts  may  be  required  before  the  curtain 
of  victory  is  finally  rung  down,  each  act  must  be  a  distinct  pro- 
gression towards  the  transformation  scene  of  peace.  If  this 
be  not  the  case,  then  an  infringement  of  the  principle  of  the 
objective  will  take  place.  This  must  be  guarded  against,  for 
each  blow  must  form  a  definite  link  in  an  offensive  chain  of  blows, 
in  which  moves,  as  in  chess,  are  seen  ahead. 

A  general  will  seldom  win  without  attacking,  and  he  will 
seldom  attack  correctly  unless  he  has  chosen  his  objective  with 
reference  to  the  principles  of  war,  and  unless  his  attack  is  based 
on  these  principles.  Imagination  is  a  great  detective,  but 
imagination  which  is  not  based  on  the  sound  foundation  of  reason 
is  at  best  but  a  capricious  leader.     Even  genius  itself,  unless  it 


32  The  Reformation  of  War 

be  stiffened  by  powerful  weapons,  a  high  moral,  discipline  and 
training,  can  only  be  likened  to  a  marksman  armed  with  a 
blunderbuss — ability  wasted  through  insufficiency  of  means. 
Conversely,  an  efficient  army  led  by  an  antiquated  soldier  may 
be  compared  to  a  machine  gun  in  the  hands  of  an  arbalister. 

(hi.)  The  Principle  of  Security.  The  objective  in  battle 
being  to  destroy  or  paralyse  the  enemy's  fighting  strength, 
consequently  the  side  which  can  best  secure  itself  against  the 
action  of  its  antagonist  will  stand  the  best  chance  of  winning, 
for  by  saving  its  men  and  weapons,  its  organization  and  moral, 
it  will  augment  its  offensive  power.  Security  is,  therefore,  a 
shield  and  not  a  lethal  weapon,  consequently  the  defensive  is 
not  the  strongest  form  of  war,  but  merely  a  prelude  to  the  accom- 
plishment of  the  objective — the  defeat  of  the  enemy  by  means 
of  the  offensive  invigorated  by  defensive  measures.  The  offensive 
being  essential  to  success,  it  stands  to  reason  that  security  without 
reference  to  the  offensive  is  no  security  at  all,  but  merely  delayed 
suicide. 

As  danger  and  the  fear  of  danger  are  the  chief  moral  obstacles 
of  the  battlefield,  it  follows  that  the  imbuing  of  troops  with  a 
sense  of  security  is  one  of  the  chief  duties  of  a  commander,  for, 
if  weapons  be  of  equal  power,  battles  are  won  by  a  superiority 
of  nerve  rather  than  by  a  superiority  of  numbers.  This  sense  of 
security,  though  it  may  be  supplemented  by  artifice,  is  chiefly 
based  on  the  feeling  of  moral  ascendance  due  to  fighting  efficiency 
and  confidence  in  command.  Given  the  skilled  soldier,  the  moral 
ascendancy  resulting  from  his  efficiency  will  rapidly  evaporate 
unless  it  be  skilfully  directed  and  employed.  Ultimately,  as  in 
all  undertakings,  civil  or  military,  we  come  back  to  the  impulse 
of  the  moment,  that  is  to  the  brains  which  control  each  individual 
nerve  which  runs  through  the  military  body.  To  give  skilled 
troops  to  an  unskilled  leader  is  tantamount  to  throwing  snow  on 
hot  bricks.  Skill  in  command  is,  therefore,  the  foundation 
of  security,  for  a  clumsy  craftsman  will  soon  take  the  edge  off 
his  tools. 

The  basis  of  strategical  security  is  the  soundness  of  the 


The  Science  and  Art  of  War  33 

general  plan  of  action,  the  infrequency  of  the  change  of  objective 
or  of  direction,  and  of  the  absence  of  unnecessary  movement. 
Strategical  security  is  also  arrived  at  by  placing  an  army  in  a 
good  position  to  hit  at  the  communications  and  headquarters 
of  the  enemy  while  protecting  its  own  :  by  so  disposing  a  force 
that  it  may  live  at  ease  and  fight  efficiently. 

Grand  tactical  security  may  be  defined  as  the  choosing  of  a 
vulnerable  target  or  the  refusal  to  offer  one.  Here  the  factors 
are  mainly  those  of  time  and  space — the  rapid  massing  of  weapons 
at  the  decisive  point  whether  for  attack  or  defence,  and  the 
general  organization  of  the  battle  itself.  Minor  tactical  security 
embraces  the  entire  gamut  of  a  soldier's  actions  :  his  individual 
moral  and  efficiency,  the  quickness  and  audacity  of  his  leader, 
the  judgment  and  determination  of  his  commander  and  the 
confidence  of  his  comrades,  as  well  as  the  superiority  of  his 
weapons,  means  of  movement  and  protection. 

(iv.)  The  Principle  of  Concentration.  Concentration,  or 
the  bringing  of  things  or  ideas  to  a  point  of  union,  presupposes 
movement ;  movement  of  ideas,  especially  in  an  army,  is  a  far 
more  difficult  operation  than  the  movement  of  men.  Never- 
theless, unless  ideas,  strategical,  tactical  and  administrative, 
be  concentrated,  cohesion  of  effort  will  not  result ;  and  in  pro- 
portion as  unity  of  action  is  lacking,  so  will  an  army's  strength, 
moral  and  physical,  be  squandered  in  detail  until  a  period  be 
arrived  at  in  which  the  smallest  result  will  be  obtained  from  every 
effort.  The  central  idea  of  an  army  is  known  as  its  "  doctrine," 
which,  to  be  sound,  must  be  based  on  the  principles  of  war, 
and  which,  to  be  effective,  must  be  elastic  enough  to  admit  of 
mutation  in  accordance  with  change  of  circumstances.  In  its 
ultimate  relationship  to  human  understanding,  this  central  idea 
or  doctrine  is  nothing  else  than  common-sense,  namely,  action 
adapted  to  circumstances.  The  danger  of  a  doctrine  per  se  is  that 
it  is  apt  to  ossify  into  a  dogma  and  to  be  seized  upon  by  mental 
emasculates  who  lack  the  power  of  analytic  criticism  and  syn- 
thetic thought,  and  who  are  only  too  grateful  to  rest  assured 
that  their  actions,  however  inept,  find  justification  in  a  book 

3 


34  The  Reformation  of  War 

which,  if  they  think  at  all,  is,  in  their  opinion,  written  in  order  to 
exonerate  them  from  doing  so.  In  the  past,  many  armies  have 
been  destroyed  by  internal  discord,  and  some  have  been  destroyed 
by  the  weapons  of  their  antagonists,  but  the  majority  have 
perished  through  adhering  to  dogmas  springing  from  their  past 
successes,  that  is  self-destruction,  or  suicide,  through  inertia  of 
mind. 

Though  an  army  should  operate  according  to  the  idea  which, 
through  concentration,  has  become  part  of  its  nature,  the  brain  of 
its  commander  must  in  no  way  be  hampered  by  preconceived  or 
fixed  opinions,  for,  while  it  is  right  that  the  soldier  should  consider 
himself  invincible,  it  is  never  right  that  the  commander  should 
consider  himself  undefeatable.  Contempt  for  an  enemy,  how- 
ever badly  led,  has  frequently  led  to  disaster  ;  therefore  it  is  the 
first  duty  of  the  commander  to  concentrate  on  common-sense, 
and  to  maintain  his  doctrine  in  solution  so  that  it  may  easily 
take  the  mould  of  whatever  circumstances  it  may  have  to  be  cast 
in.  Strategy  should  be  based  on  this  doctrine  of  action  adapted 
to  circumstances,  and,  consequently,  concentration  in  strategy 
may  be  defined  as  making  the  most  of  opportunity  and  also  of 
forecasting  and  foreseeing  the  possibility  of  opportunity  before 
it  arises. 

As  strategical  actions  chiefly  depend  on  means  of  movement, 
so  equally  does  the  concentration  of  the  forces  engaged  in  them 
depend  on  communications ;  consequently,  from  the  network 
formed  by  the  lines  of  supply  is  evolved  grand  tactical  concentra- 
tion, the  object  of  which  is  to  overcome  resistance  by  breaking  it 
down  or  turning  it  to  advantage. 

From  the  point  of  view  of  the  battle  itself,  concentration  has 
for  centuries  been  based  on  the  maxim  of  "  superiority  of  numbers 
at  the  decisive  point,"  because  numbers  were  the  coefficient  of 
weapons,  each  man  normally  being  a  one-weapon  mounting. 
This  maxim  no  longer  holds  good  as  a  general  rule,  and  in  its 
place  must  be  substituted  .  "  superiority  of  moral,  weapons, 
means  of  movement  and  protection."  Men,  in  themselves,  are 
an  encumbrance  on  the  battlefield,  and  the  fewer  men  we  employ, 


The  Science  and  Art  of  War  35 

without  detracting  from  sufficiency  of  weapon-power,  the  greater 
will  be  our  concentration  of  strength,  for  the  aim  of  concentration 
is  as  much  concerned  with  securing  an  army  against  blows  as  it  is 
with  enabling  an  army  to  deliver  them. 

(v.)  The  Principle  of  Economy  of  Force.  Economy  of  force 
may  be  defined  as  the  efficient  use  of  all  means  :  physical,  moral 
and  material,  towards  winning  a  war.  Of  all  the  principles  of 
war  it  is  the  most  difficult  to  apply,  because  of  its  close  inter- 
dependence on  the  ever  changing  conditions  of  war.  In  order  to 
economize  the  moral  energy  of  his  men,  a  commander  must  not 
only  be  in  spirit  one  of  them,  but  must  ever  have  his  fingers  on  the 
pulse  of  the  fighters.  What  they  feel  he  must  feel,  and  what  they 
think  he  must  think  ;  but  while  they  feel  fear,  experience  dis- 
comfort and  think  in  terms  of  easy  victory  or  disaster,  though  he 
must  understand  what  all  these  mean  to  the  men  themselves,  he 
must  in  no  way  be  obsessed  by  them.  To  him  economy  of  force 
first  means  planning  a  battle  which  his  men  can  fight,  and  secondly, 
adjusting  this  plan  according  to  the  psychological  changes  which 
the  enemy's  resistance  is  producing  on  their  endurance  without 
forgoing  his  objective.  This  does  not  only  entail  his  possessing 
judgment,  but  also  foresight  and  imagination.  His  plan  must 
never  crystallize,  for  the  energy  of  the  battle  front  is  always 
fluid.  He  must  realize  that  a  fog,  or  shower  of  rain,  a  cold  night 
or  unexpected  resistance  may  force  him  to  adjust  his  plan,  and, 
in  order  to  enable  him  to  do  so,  the  grand  tactical  economy  of 
force  rests  with  his  reserves,  which  form  the  staying  power  of  the 
battle  and  the  fuel  of  all  tactical  movement. 

On  the  battlefield,  to  economize  his  own  strength  and  by 
means  of  feints  and  surprisals  to  force  the  enemy  to  dissipate  his, 
is  the  first  step  towards  victory.  Every  weapon  which  he  can 
compel  the  enemy  to  withdraw  from  the  point  of  attack  is  an 
obstacle  removed  from  the  eventual  path  of  progress.  Every 
subsidiary  operation  should  be  based  on  the  objective  and  effect 
a  concentration  of  weapon-power  on  the  day  of  decisive  action. 
Every  subsidiary  action  should  add,  therefore,  an  increasing  value 
to  victory,  that  is  the  power  of  producing  a  remunerative  tactical 

3* 


36  The  Reformation  of  War 

dividend.  "  Is  the  game  worth  the  candle  ?  "  This  is  the 
question  every  commander  must  ask  himself  before  playing  at 
war. 

By  this  I  do  not  mean  that  risks  must  never  be  taken,  far 
from  it,  for  it  is  by  taking  risks  which  are  worth  taking  that,  more 
often  than  not,  the  greatest  economies  are  effected  and  the  highest 
interest  secured.  In  war,  audacity  is  nearly  always  right  and 
gambling  is  nearly  always  wrong,  and  the  worst  form  of  gambling 
in  war  is  gambling  with  small  stakes  ;  for  by  this  process  an  army 
is  eventually  bled  white. 

Economy  of  force  is  also  closely  related  to  economy  of  move- 
ment. Many  generals  have  attempted  to  win  a  military  Marathon 
in  sprinting  time.  They  have  thrown  in  all  their  reserves  at 
once,  and  so  have  lost  their  wind  within  a  few  hours  of  the  battle 
opening.  Such  operations  as  these  are  doomed  to  failure  long 
before  the  first  shot  is  ever  fired. 

(vi.)  The  Principle  of  Movement.  If  concentration  of  weapon- 
power  be  compared  to  a  projectile  and  economy  of  force  to  its 
line  of  fire,  then  movement  may  be  looked  upon  as  the  propellant 
and  as  a  propellant  is  not  always  in  a  state  of  explosive  energy,  so 
neither  is  movement.  Movement  is  the  power  of  endowing  mass 
with  momentum  ;  it  depends,  therefore,  largely  on  security, 
which,  when  coupled  with  offensive  power,  results  in  liberty  of 
action.  Movement,  consequently,  may  be  potential  as  well  as 
dynamic,  and,  if  an  army  be  compared  to  a  machine  the  power  of 
which  is  supplied  to  it  by  a  series  of  accumulators,  should 
the  object  of  its  commander  be  to  maintain  movement, 
he  can  only  accomplish  this  by  refilling  one  set  of  accumulators 
while  the  other  is  in  process  of  being  exhausted.  The  shorter 
the  time  available  to  do  this  the  more  difficult  will  the  com- 
mander's task  be  ;  consequently,  one  of  his  most  important 
duties,  throughout  war,  is  to  increase  the  motive  power  of  his 
troops,  which  depends  on  two  main  factors — moral  and  physical 
endurance. 

In  war,  the  power  to  move  must  first  be  considered  in  the 
form  of  the  general  will  to  move.     In  battle  the  forward  impulse 


The  Science  and  Art  of  War  37 

comes  from  the  leaders  and  the  troops  themselves.  They  are, 
in  fact,  self-propelled  projectiles  and  are  not  impelled  forward  by 
the  explosive  energy  of  command.  Such  energy  scarcely  if  ever 
exists ;  what  does  exist  is  direction  to  its  impulse,  and  the  rein- 
forcing or  recharging  of  this  impulse  with  more  power  by  means 
of  reserves.  These  reserves  not  only  endow  the  combatants 
with  physical  energy  but  with  a  moral  sense  of  power  and  security 
which  impels  them  forward. 

Even  with  an  army  of  high  moral,  that  is  to  say  an  army 
which  possesses  the  will  to  move  towards  danger,  or,  inversely, 
the  will  to  refuse  to  move  away  from  danger,  it  must  ultimately 
be  the  physical  factor,  the  muscular  endurance  of  the  men  them- 
selves, which  sets  a  limit  to  their  power  of  movement.  In  order 
to  increase  muscular  movement,  by  conserving  it  as  long  as 
possible,  mechanical  means  of  movement  have  for  some  time 
been  employed  for  the  strategical  and  administrative  movements 
of  an  army  ;  so  much  so  that  the  approach  movements  to-day 
are  based  on  locomotives  and  lorries.  The  result  of  this  is  that, 
while  strategical  mobility,  namely  movement  at  a  distance  from 
the  enemy,  has  enormously  increased,  tactical  movement,  through 
increase  of  impedimenta,  has  decreased  in  inverse  proportion, 
until  battles  founded  on  muscular  movement  have  become  more 
often  than  not  static  engagements  based  on  broadside  fire  from 
fixed  positions.  In  order  to  overcome  this  immobility,  mechani- 
cal cross-country  movement  has  been  forced  on  armies,  and,  what- 
ever may  be  the  prejudice  shown  to  its  introduction,  the  complete 
replacement  of  muscular  movement  by  it  is  as  near  a  certainty 
as  can  be  foreseen. 

(vii.)  The  Principle  of  Surprise.  Lack  of  security,  or  a  false 
interpretation  of  the  principle  of  security,  leads  directly  to  being 
surprised.  The  principle  of  surprise,  like  a  double-edged  tool,  is 
an  exceedingly  dangerous  one  in  unskilled  hands  ;  for,  being 
mainly  controlled  by  psychological  factors,  its  nature  is  less 
stable  and  the  conditions  affecting  it  are  more  difficult  to 
gauge. 

Surprise,  in  its  direct  meaning,  presupposes  the  unexpected, 


38  The  Reformation  of  War 

which,  throughout  history,  may  be  considered  under  five  general 
headings  : 

(i.)  Surprise  effected  by  superiority  of  courage, 
(ii.)  Surprise  effected  by  superiority  of  movement, 
(hi.)  Suprise  effected  by  superiority  of  protection, 
(iv.)  Surprise  effected  by  superiority  of  weapons, 
(v.)  Surprise  effected  by  superiority  of  tactics. 

To  gain  superiority  in  anything  or  any  quality  takes  time,  conse- 
quently we  find  that,  although  minor  surprisals  may  be  gained  by 
seizing  upon  the  right  opportunities,  the  possibility  of  effecting 
major  surprisals  is  based  extensively  on  forecasts  and  prepara- 
tions made  during  days  of  peace,  especially  as  regards  the  nature 
and  requirements  of  the  next  war,  for  the  surest  foundation  of 
being  surprised  is  to  suppose  that  the  next  war  will  be  like  the 
last  one.  In  modern  times,  similarity  between  wars  has  seldom 
occurred,  as  the  most  casual  retrospect  into  military  history  will 
prove ;  consequently,  when  a  commander  attempts  to  copy 
former  battles,  we  find  that  an  army  is  frequently  surprised  with 
its  eyes  open.  It  sees  things  coming,  but,  blinded  by  prejudice 
and  shackled  by  tradition,  it  does  not  perceive  their  consequences, 
which  are  only  realized  when  their  causes  have  taken  or  are 
actually  taking  effect. 

On  the  battlefield  itself  a  general  is  frequently  surprised  by 
his  own  stupidity,  his  lack  of  being  able  to  understand  conditions 
or  to  apply  to  them  the  principles  of  war.  His  stupidity  some- 
times takes  the  acute  form  of  completely  misunderstanding  the 
endurance  of  his  men  ;  not  realizing  what  they  can  do,  he  orders 
them  to  do  something  which  they  cannot  do,  and  the  result  is 
chaos  and  loss  of  life.  Surprise  among  troops,  as  among  in- 
dividuals, is  largely  a  matter  of  nerves.  The  nerves  of  an  army 
are  not  only  to  be  found  in  the  individual  temperaments  and 
collective  suggestibility  of  the  officers  and  men,  but  also  in  its  staff 
organization.  The  trunk  nerves  of  an  army  are  its  general  staff, 
whose  one  great  duty  is  to  convey  the  impressions  felt  by  the 
rank  and  file  to  the  brains  of  their  commander.     If  this  be 


The  Science  and  Art  of  War  39 

neglected  the  best  laid  plan  will  fail  and  paralysis  of  action  will 
result  in  being  surprised. 

(viii.)  The  Principle  of  Co-operation.  Co-operation  is  a 
cementing  principle  ;  it  is  closely  related  to  economy  of  force,  and 
therefore  to  concentration,  but  it  differs  from  both  of  these 
principles,  for  while  mass  is  the  concentrated  strength  of  the 
organism  and  economy  of  force  the  dispersed  strength  which 
renders  the  former  stable,  co-operation  may  be  likened  to  the 
muscular  tension  which  knits  all  the  parts  into  one  whole.  With- 
out co-operation  an  army  falls  to  pieces.  In  national  wars,  the 
value  of  co-operation  is  enormously  enhanced,  fusing,  as  it  does, 
the  body  and  soul  of  a  nation  into  one  intricate  self-supporting 
organism.  All  must  pull  together,  for  such  wars  are  the  wars  of 
entire  nations,  and,  whatever  may  be  the  size  of  the  armies 
operating,  these  should  be  looked  upon  as  national  weapons,  and 
not  as  fractions  of  nations  whose  duty  is  to  fight  while  the  civil 
population  turns  thumbs  up  or  thumbs  down.  Gladiatorial 
wars  are  dead  and  gone. 

We  find,  therefore,  that  for  us  co-operation  in  war  embraces 
the  whole  gamut  of  our  Imperial  existence,  which  means  that 
during  war  one  master  mind  must  control  the  whole  national 
machinery,  in  order  to  reduce  the  friction  which  its  adjustment 
by  many  hands  inevitably  creates.  Take,  for  instance,  the 
government  of  a  nation  at  war.  If  there  be  friction  in  the 
government,  there  is  friction  not  only  throughout  the  nation 
but  throughout  the  army.  No  man  can  efficiently  serve  two 
masters,  neither  can  two  masters  lead  and  direct  the  same  man. 
If  in  a  cabinet  of  six  members  each  strives  to  conduct  a  war 
departmentally,  according  to  his  own  particular  degree  of  ig- 
norance in  strategy,  in  place  of  one  objective  there  will  be  six 
objectives,  or,  worse  still,  six  phases  of  one  objective.  When  such 
a  state  of  affairs  arises  it  is  time  to  declare  a  dictatorship,  for 
dispersion  of  force  in  war  is  to  commit  suicide  while  temporarily 
insane.  There  can  be  but  one  main  objective ;  consequently, 
all  subsidiary  ones  must  be  reduced  to  their  utmost  limit  to  enable 
the  concentration  of  all  requisite  battle-power  at  the  decisive 


40  The  Reformation  of  War 

point.  One  objective  requires  one  master-mind  to  formulate 
the  general  plan,  and  not  half  a  dozen  jacks  of  all  trades  to  dissipate 
it.  One  master  mind  must  control  the  war,  and  all  other  minds 
must  accept  or  be  compelled  to  accept  his  ruling. 

Tactically,  co-operation  is  based  on  battle  organization, 
weapons,  protection  and  movement,  skill,  confidence,  discipline 
and  determination  :  it  is  moral,  physical  and  mechanical.  This 
means  that  all  must  work  for  the  attainment  of  the  objective 
and  not  for  themselves.  The  weeding  out  of  fools  and  knaves 
is,  therefore,  the  first  step  to  be  accomplished.  The  second  is 
the  scrapping  of  bureaucratic  processes  and  shibboleths,  and  the 
bringing  of  ability  to  the  top.  Senility  of  thought  is  the  antithesis 
of  co-operative  action.  A  vintage  of  new  ideas  is  always  produced 
in  war,  and  the  vats  must  be  sufficient  and  the  bottles  strong 
enough  to  hold  it ;  for  new  ideas,  like  new  wine,  go  through  a 
process  of  fermentation,  which  in  an  army  commanded  by  a 
weak-headed  general  can  only  lead  to  tactical  intoxication. 
Co-operation  in  its  widest  sense  spells  not  only  military  efficiency 
but  national  and  Imperial  efficiency,  which  centred  round  one 
line  of  direction  impels  all  the  life  and  fighting  strength  of  the 
nation  towards  victory.  Without  such  an  axis  an  army  fights 
floundering. 

Principles  in  themselves  are  not  worth  the  paper  they  are 
written  on,  for  they  are  but  mere  words  strung  together  in  a 
certain  order.  Their  value  lies  in  their  application,  and  this 
application  depends  on  the  thousand  and  one  conditions  which 
surround  the  elements  of  war  during  operations.  What  are 
these  conditions,  for  without  knowing  them  it  is  manifestly 
impossible  to  apply  the  principles  ?  Conditions  are  innumerable 
and  ever  changing,  but  the  following  are  some  of  the  most  im- 
portant :  Time,  space,  ground,  weather,  numbers,  training,  com- 
munications, supply,  armament,  formations,  obstacles  and 
observation. 

Each  of  these  conditions  may  be  considered  as  possessing  a 
dual  nature — a  power  of  increasing  the  strength  of  the  offensive 
and  a  power  of  increasing  the  strength  of  the  defensive  ;    each, 


The  Science  and  Art  of  War  41 

therefore,  may  be  looked  upon  as  possessing  power  to  enhance 
offensive  and  defensive  action  in  war. 

A  commander  has  three  means  at  his  disposal  to  deal  with  a 
condition  : 

(i.)  He  may  avoid  it. 

(ii.)  He  may  break  it  down. 

(hi.)  He  may  turn  it  to  his  own  advantage. 

The  third  course,  which  masters  the  difficulty,  is  manifestly 
the  best,  and  it  is  the  one  which  even  a  superficial  study  of 
military  history  will  show  was  employed  by  the  great  Captains 
of  war,  it  was  in  fact  the  secret  of  their  success. 

At  the  beginning  of  this  Chapter  I  stated  that,  when  two 
men  fought  their  object  was  to  impose  their  will  upon  each 
other.  Up  to  the  present  I  have  mainly  considered  the  means 
employed  in  order  to  accomplish  this,  and  the  principles  governing 
these  means.  I  will  now  turn  to  the  psychological  side  of  war, 
and  show  that  it  also  has  its  elements,  principles  and  conditions. 

I  will  examine  once  again  the  primitive  duel  between  two 
unarmed  men,  and  from  it  will  extract  certain  facts  which  may 
be  classed  as  psychological  elements.  We  first  find  the  primordial 
material — man,  but  this  time  represented  not  by  muscle  but  by 
mind.  As  the  physiological  object  of  the  fighter  is  "to  kill 
without  being  killed,"  so  is  his  psychological  object  "  to  will 
without  being  willed."  In  these  five  words  is  presented  the 
pivotal  psychological  problem  in  the  science  of  war — the  de- 
struction of  the  enemy's  will,  which  not  only  cements  together 
his  army  but  the  whole  of  his  nation  in  a  vast  living  mosaic. 

In  war,  as  in  all  other  phases  of  human  activity,  we  find 
that  the  elemental  psychological  power  is  mind.  In  the  case  of 
our  two  unarmed  fighters,  both  fear  the  other,  there  is  no  courage 
in  the  normal  meaning  of  the  word  ;  both  desire  to  kill  the  other, 
and  both  instinctively  take  advantage  of  any  opportunity  to 
do  so,  especially,  if  by  so  doing,  little  risk  be  run.  We  here 
obtain  three  elements  : 

(i.)  Will— desire  to  kill. 


42  The  Reformation  of  War 

(ii.)  Cunning — opportunity  to  kill  at  the  smallest  risk, 
(iii.)  Fear — desire  to  live. 

The  first  is  the  mobile  element,  the  second  and  third  the 
offensive  and  the  defensive  elements  respectively. 

In  primitive  man,  the  first  is  awakened  through  threats  to 
self-  and  family-preservation  ;  in  civilized  man,  though  these  bear 
equal  sway,  to  them  must  be  added  the  more  recently  acquired 
instincts  of  race-  and  national-preservation  with  all  their  rami- 
fications— social,  political  and  commercial.     From  the  second, 
the  making  good  of  opportunity,  we  get  a  most  complex  evolu- 
tion :    cunning  evolving  into  knowledge,  education,  science  and 
art.     From  a  tactical  standpoint,  natural  cunning,  as  it  presents 
itself  in  the  primitive  duel,  evolves  into  the  skill  of  the  scientific 
fighter.     Skill,  reacting  on  the  will,  is  a  great  incentive  to  moral, 
or  confidence.     The  greater  the  skill  of  the  soldier,  the  greater 
will  this  confidence  become,  and,  as  confidence  in  the  weapons 
used  plays  as  important  a  part  in  the  growth  of  moral  as  skill 
in  the  use  of  the  weapons  themselves,  we  find  that  every  improve- 
ment in  weapons  carries  with  it  a  psychological  impulse.     Thus, 
a  man,  who  unarmed,  will  tremble  before  a  footpad,  feels  no  fear 
when  covering  him  with  a  revolver.     This  is  so  important  a 
point   that  it  forms  one  of  the  main  problems  of  this  book. 
Weapons   being   material   means  of  accomplishing   mental   im- 
pulses, not  only  do  they  stimulate  the  will  by  instilling  confidence 
(moral),  but  skill  in  their  use  depends  on  this  stimulation.     There- 
fore, we  find  that,  in  order  to  control  the  third  element,  the  mental 
powers  of  the  soldier,  as  aggregated  in  his  will,  must  never  become 
slack,  lazy  or  paralysed.     They  must  be  held  in  a  state  of  attention 
on  the  "  desire  to  win."     This  state  of  attention  may  be  sym- 
bolized by  the  quality  called  "  courage,"  which,  in  war,  simply 
means  a  state  of  less  fear  than  that  in  which  the  enemy  is  in, 
and  not  necessarily  a  sense  of  personal  superiority  such  as  might 
be  felt  by  a  poet  or  artist  over  a  clodhopper  or  successful  grocer. 
This  state  of  courage,  it  will  be  seen,  is  equally  dependent  on  skill 
in  movement,  weapons  and  protection,  and  the  superiority  of  these 


I 


The  Science  and  Art  of  War  43 

elements  themselves  over  those  of  the  enemy.  Thus,  from  will, 
through  the  reaction  of  cunning,  which  I  will  now  call  moral, 
and  fear,  is  scientific  fighting  evolved. 

Though  the  principles  of  war  are  equally  applicable  to  the 
psychological  aspects  of  this  science,  there  are  certain  definite 
psychological  principles  which  may  be  abstracted  alike  from 
the  primitive  duel  and  the  scientific  battle.  There  is,  first  of 
all,  a  desire  or  "  determination  "  to  fight,  either  on  one  side  or 
both.  The  contest  opens,  therefore,  with  two  wills  in  opposition. 
The  giving  and  aiming  of  blows  is  made  in  order  to  enforce  the 
will,  and  the  avoiding  of  them  to  prevent  the  will  being  enforced. 
This  enforcement  I  will  call  "  demoralization,"  and  the  avoidance 
of  it  "  endurance."  From  these  we  can  extract  three  great 
principles  : 

(i.)  The  principle  of  determination, 
(ii.)  The  principle  of  demoralization, 
(hi.)  The  principle  of  endurance. 

These  psychological  principles  constitute  a  definite  link 
between  the  physical  and  mental  sides  of  the  science  of  war,' 
which  may  be  depicted  as  follows  : 

MAN 


(  Movement. .  (Principle  of  Determination)  .  .Will} 

Muscle  I  Weapons  . .  (Principle  of  Endurance) . . .  .Moral  >Mind. 

(  Protection . .  (Principle  of  Demoralization) . .  Fear  j 

We  start  with  man  physical  and  man  mental ;  he  must 
possess  the  will  to  fight  and  the  power  to  move,  the  connecting 
link  is  the  principle  of  determination  or  the  will  to  win.  He  must 
possess  the  moral  to  hit  and  the  power  to  hit,  here  the  connecting 
link  is  the  principle  of  endurance.  He  must  endow  his  adversary 
with  a  fear  which  will  force  him  to  protect  himself  or  seek  pro- 
tection, which  is  acknowledgment  of  lack  of  endurance 
(temporary  or  permanent) ,  and  inferiority  of  determination  ;  here 
the  connecting  link  is  the  principle  of  demoralization.  Thus, 
we  see  that,  in  war,  the  "  will  to  win  "  is  the  power  of  being 
able  to  endure  and  to  demoralize,  and  that  the  three  psychological 


44  The  Reformation  of  War 

elements  are  not  "  things  in  themselves  "  but  coefficients  of  the 
elements  of  war — movement,  weapons  and  protection. 

As  1  have  dealt  at  some  length  with  the  principles  of  war,  it 
is  only  fitting  that  I  should  now  examine  these  psychological 
principles,  for  they  are  no  less  important.  Briefly,  the  following 
are  my  views  : 

(i.)  The  Principle  of  Determination.  The  limits  of  the  principle 
of  determination  are  first  defined  by  the  national  objective  of 
war,  and  secondly  by  its  military  objective.  Between  these 
two  boundaries  this  principle  operates. 

From  the  national  point  of  view,  there  is  the  will  to  impose 
upon  the  enemy's  government  a  policy  distasteful  to  it ;  this 
policy  must  be  clean  cut,  for  on  its  stability  rests  the  military 
objective,  which  psychologically  is  the  "  will  to  win."  Sub- 
jectively, this  will  is  concentrated  in  the  mind  of  the  commander, 
whose  plan  of  action  is  the  means  of  enforcing  the  national 
policy  ;  this  plan  must  also  be  clean  cut,  that  is  to  say  it  must 
be  so  simple  that  its  very  nature  will  give  rise  to  the  fewest 
possible  complexities.  As  the  stability  of  this  plan  will  depend 
on  the  stability  of  the  policy,  the  commander-in-chief  must  not 
only  be  acquainted  with  the  nature  of  this  policy,  but  with 
any  changes  rendered  necessary  through  fluctuations  in  national 
conditions.  Inversely,  any  changes  in  plan  will  entail  modi- 
fications in  policy ;  consequently,  we  find  that  both  the  plan 
and  the  policy  are  correlatives,  that  is  they  are  dependent  on 
each  other's  stability.  Now,  as  every  policy  must  be  plastic 
enough  to  admit  of  fluctuations  in  national  conditions,  so  must 
each  plan  be  plastic  -enough  to  receive  the  impressions  of  war, 
that  is  power  to  change  its  shape  without  changing  or  cracking 
its  substance.  This  plasticity  is  determined  psychologically 
by  the  condition  of  mentality  in  the  two  opposing  forces.  There 
is  the  determination  between  the  two  commanders-in-chief, 
and  between  them  and  their  men,  and,  ultimately,  between  the 
two  forces  themselves.  The  "  will  to  win  "  is,  therefore,  first 
of  all  a  duel  between  two  brains  each  controlling  a  weapon 
called  an  army ;    and  secondly,  a  struggle  between  two    armies 


The  Science  and  Art  of  War  45 

each  equipped  with  various  types  of  weapons.  If  all  these 
various  weapons,  each  influencing  in  its  own  degree  the  mentality 
of  its  wielder  and  that  of  his  opponent,  can  be  reduced  in  number, 
the  principle  of  determination  becomes  more  simple  in  application. 
If,  again,  similarity  of  protection  becomes  possible,  simplicity 
is  increased  ;  and  if,  finally,  similarity  of  movement  can  be  added, 
physically  the  simplest  form  of  army  is  evolved. 

I  will  now  examine  the  psychological  side.  If  the  will  and 
moral  of  each  individual  can  be  brought  to  a  high  but  equal  level 
and  his  fear  to  a  low  and  equal  level,  the  commander-in-chief  will 
possess  known  qualities  out  of  which  to  construct  his  plan.  It 
will  be  seen,  therefore,  that,  in  its  broadest  sense,  the  principle  of 
determination  is  the  simplification  of  the  means  so  that  the  will 
of  both  the  chief  and  his  men  may  become  operative. 

(ii.)  The  Principle  of  Endurance.  Springing  directly  from 
the  principle  of  determination  is  the  great  principle  of  endurance . 
The  will  of  the  commander-in-chief  and  the  will  of  his  men  must 
endure,  that  is  the}'  must  continue  in  the  same  state.  It  is  the 
local  conditions,  mental  and  material,  which  continually  weaken 
this  state  and  in  war  often  threaten  to  submerge  it.  To  the 
commander  endurance  consists,  therefore,  in  power  of  overcoming 
conditions — by  foresight,  judgment  and  skill.  These  qualities 
cannot  be  cultivated  at  a  moment's  notice,  and  the  worst  place 
to  seek  their  cultivation  is  on  the  battlefield  itself.  The  com- 
mander-in-chief must  be,  therefore,  a  mental  athlete,  his  dumb- 
bells, clubs  and  bars  being  the  elements  of  war  and  his  exercises 
the  application  of  the  principles  of  war  to  the  conditions  of  in- 
numerable problems. 

Collectively,  in  an  army,  endurance  is  intimately  connected 
with  numbers,  and,  paradoxical  as  it  may  seem,  the  greater  the 
size  of  an  army  the  less  is  its  psychological  endurance.  The 
reason  for  this  is  a  simple  one  :  one  man  has  one  mind  ;  two  men 
have  three  minds — each  his  own  and  a  crowd  mind  shared  be- 
tween them  ;  a  million  men  have  millions  and  millions  and 
millions  of  minds.  If  a  task  which  normally  requires  a  million 
men  can  be  carried  out  by  one  man,  this  one  man  possesses 


46  The  Reformation  of  War 

psychologically  an  all  but  infinitely  higher  endurance  than  any 
single  man  out  of  the  million.  Man,  I  will  again  repeat,  is  an 
encumbrance  on  the  battlefield,  psychologically  as  well  as 
physically ;  consequently,  endurance  should  not  be  sought  in 
numbers,  for  one  Achilles  is  worth  a  hundred  hoplites. 

(iii.)  The  Principle  of  Demoralization.  As  the  principle  of 
endurance  has,  as  its  primary  object,  the  security  of  the  minds  of 
men  by  shielding  their  moral  against  the  shock  of  battle,  in- 
versely the  principle  of  demoralization  has  as  its  object  the  de- 
struction of  this  moral  :  first,  in  the  moral  attack  against  the 
spirit  and  nerves  of  the  enemy's  nation  and  government ;  secondly 
against  this  nation's  policy  ;  thirdly  against  the  plan  of  its  com- 
mander-in-chief, and  fourthly  against  the  moral  of  the  soldiers 
commanded  by  him.  Hitherto  the  fourth,  the  least  important 
of  these  objectives,  has  been  considered  by  the  traditionally- 
minded  soldier  as  the  sole  psychological  objective  of  this  great 
principle.  In  the  last  great  war  the  result  of  this  was,  as  I  shall 
show  presentfy,  that  the  attack  on  the  remaining  three  only  slowly 
evolved  during  days  of  stress  and  because  of  a  faulty  appreciation 
of  this  principle  during  peace  time. 

I  will  now  turn  to  the  psychological  conditions  of  war. 

In  considering  these  it  must  first  be  realized  that  all  conditions 
are,  in  part  at  least,  psychological.  That  is  to  say  they  stimulate 
the  brain  in  a  greater  or  lesser  degree  ;  but  while  hundreds  affect 
war  materially,  such  as  roads  for  supply  and  the  influence  of 
gravity  on  the  flight  of  projectiles,  thousands  more  directly  affect 
the  mind  of  the  soldier,  and  through  his  mind  his  body,  and 
through  his  body  his  actions.  Psychologically,  we  may  divide 
these  conditions  into  three  general  categories  :  those  which  are 
common  to  men  either  individually  or  collectively  ;  those  which 
affect  the  soldier  as  an  individual,  and  those  which  affect  a  mass 
of  soldiers  as  a  homogeneous  crowd.  The  following  are  examples 
of  these  categories  : 

(i.)  General    Conditions :     Safety,    comfort,    fatigue,    catch- 
words, loyalty,  honour,  faith,  hatred  and  cheerfulness. 


The  Science  and  Art  of  War  47 

(ii.)  Individual  Conditions  :  Knowledge,  skill,  determination, 
endurance,  courage,  imagination,  confidence,  talent  and 
sense  of  duty. 

(iii.)  Collective  Conditions :  Suggestion,  intuition,  supersti- 
tion, esprit  de  corps,  tradition,  moral,  education,  patriotism 
and  comradeship. 

I  do  not  propose  to  analyse  these  conditions  as  it  would  take 
a  long  time  to  do  so,  nevertheless  it  should  be  remembered  that 
the  psychological  principles  in  war  cannot  be  applied  correctly 
unless  the  conditions  which  go  to  build  up  soldiership  have  been 
stabilized,  long  prior  to  war,  in  days  of  peace. 

The  process  whereby  this  stability  is  effected  is  called  training. 
Training  forms  the  true  foundation  of  battle,  which  should  be  a 
continuation  of  the  soldier's  education,  just  as  war  itself  should  be 
a  continuation  of  peace  policy.  For  this  to  be  possible  it  will  be 
at  once  seen  that  training  should  not  be  based  solely  on  the  known 
conditions  of  past  wars,  but  above  all  on  the  probable  conditions 
of  the  next  war.  That,  consequently,  these  conditions  must  be 
foreseen  ;  therefore,  on  the  correctness  of  their  forecasting  will, 
to  a  great  extent,  depend  the  continuity  of  peace  training  in  the 
form  of  battle  tactics  when  war  breaks  out.  Once  we  have 
diagnosed  the  conditions  of  the  next  war,  then,  by  applying  to 
them  the  psychological  principles,  we  shall  build  up  a  scientific 
system  of  training.  In  fact,  we  shall  start  winning  our  battle.? 
from  to-day  onwards  on  the  barrack  square  and  in  the  class-room. 
Training,  such  as  this,  may  well  be  called  the  art  of  war,  the 
foundations  of  which  I  will  now  inquire  into. 

In  analysing  tactics,  or  the  art  of  fighting,  the  military  student 
usually  visualizes  the  battle  as  a  "  thing  in  itself."  The  correct 
appreciation  is  diametrically  opposite,  for  battles  consist  of  a 
complex  series  of  individual  fights,  each  compounded  of  the  ele- 
ments of  war  operating  concentrically  round  the  problem  of  how 
to  give  blows  without  receiving  them.  This  problem  may  be 
divided  into  four  sub-problems,  which  every  commander  should 
consider  prior  to  an  operation  taking  place. 


48  The  Reformation  of  War 

These  four  problems  are  : 
(i.)  How  to  keep  men  alive  ? 
(ii.)  How  to  keep  movement  alive  ? 
(iii.)  How  to  keep  weapons  alive  ? 
(iv.)  How  to  keep  moral  alive  ? 

As  the  commander  has  four  problems  to  solve  so  also  has  the 
soldier.     He  has  : 

(i.)  To  hit  his  enemy  while  at  a  distance  from  him. 

(ii.)  To  move  towards  him. 

(iii.)  To  hit  him  at  close  quarters. 

(iv.)  To  avoid  being  hit  throughout  this  engagement. 

The  whole  of  these  eight  problems  are  in  nature  protective, 
and  they  form  the  foundations  of  offensive  power,  which  endow 
it  with  stability  of  action  as  well  as  security  during  action  and 
after  defeat. 

I  cannot  here  do  more  than  glance  at  this  fundamental  pro- 
blem of  battle  organization  :  how  to  organize  an  army  so  that  it 
possesses  power  of  stability  and  mobility.  Briefly  it  may  be 
explained  as  follows  :  As  the  bones  of  man's  body  give  stability 
to  his  muscular  movement,  so  must  every  force  of  soldiers  possess 
within  their  organization  certain  troops  which  can  resist  attack 
and  certain  others  which  can  develop  their  mobility  out  of  this 
resistance.  The  battle  of  Crecy  was  virtually  won  by  the  English 
archers,  the  mobile  element.  They  could  not,  however,  have 
accomplished  what  they  did  had  not  the  men-at-arms  and  dis- 
mounted knights  formed  a  stable  base  from  which  they  were  able 
to  develop  the  full  power  of  their  bows.  A  scientifically  organized 
army  is  one  which  possesses  a  brain  and  a  body,  both  of  which 
possess  a  positive  and  a  negative  pole,  stability  and  mobility. 
The  stability  of  the  brain  is  its  faculty  of  reason  based  on  know- 
ledge, and  its  mobility  the  faculty  of  imagination  based  on  the 
products  of  reason.  The  military  body  is  divided  into  two  main 
forces :  those  which  disorganize  the  enemy's  brain  and  body — that 
is,  break  down  its  stability,  and  those  which  annihilate  the  broken 
fragments.     Each  fraction  of  this  body  must  possess  power  to 


The  Science  and  Art  of  War  49 

resist  movement  and  power  to  develop  movement.  Its  mobility 
depends  on  a  combination  of  weapons  and  movement,  and  its 
stability  upon  that  of  weapons  and  protection.  From  these  two — 
its  stability  and  mobility,  are  its  offensive  and  protective  powers 
reciprocally  developed.  Thus,  in  the  hands  of  man,  do  we  see  a 
harmonious  inter-relation  between  the  three  physical  elements  of 
war,  and,  according  to  the  degree  of  harmony  attained,  do  the 
plans  of  man  succeed  or  fail.  This  brings  us  to  the  problem  of 
grand  tactics  or  battle  planning. 

In  every  plan  the  first  question  is  to  decide  on  the  objective. 
In  physical  warfare  the  military  objective  is  the  defeat  of  the 
enemy's  army,  so  that  the  will  of  his  government  may  be  at- 
tacked. Where,  then,  is  the  decisive  point,  the  point  at  which 
the  enemy  may  most  economically  be  defeated  ?  The  schoolmen 
answer  :  "  The  decisive  point  depends  on  circumstances,"  and 
some  suggest  a  flank  and  others  a  central  objective.  The  school- 
men, if  they  only  thought  in  simpler  terms  than  they  are  wont  to 
do,  could  have  long  ago  given  a  better  answer  to  this  question, 
which  I  will  examine  from  a  very  simple  point  of  view. 

Every  organization  has  one  great  prototype — the  body  of 
man.  When  a  boxer  fights  another  he  tries  to  get  a  left  or  right 
on  the  side  of  his  opponent's  jaw.  Why  ?  Not  to  break  the  jaw, 
the  external  body,  but  to  derange  the  brain,  the  internal  organ, 
because  more  than  any  other  organ  the  brain  controls  the  body. 

The  brain  of  an  army  is  its  command,  and  the  command  of  an 
army  is  its  decisive  point,  and  no  blow  should  be  delivered  with- 
out reference  to  this  point.  Though  the  brains  of  an  army  control 
its  whole  body,  nevertheless  the  prevailing  idea  in  tactics  is  one 
of  brute  force  applied  by  weapons  to  the  enemy's  battle  body. 
Batter  the  enemy's  muscles  blue  and  black  and  get  battered 
black  and  blue  in  return,  is  the  traditional  method,  and  then  only, 
when  one  side  is  rendered  physically  impotent,  attack  the  brains  ! 

I  fully  agree  that  more  often  than  not  it  is  impossible  to  strike 
straight  to  the  jaw  because  our  opponent  carefully  protects  his 
chin.  This  does  not,  however,  vitiate  the  fact  that  the  decisive 
point  is  the  command  of  the  opposing  army,  and  that  the  more 

4 


50  The  Reformation  of  War 

the  enemy  is  forced  to  protect  it,  the  less  will  he  be  able  to 
hit  out. 

The  elements  of  grand  tactics  are  in  essence  very  simple,  once 
the  decisive  point  has  been  agreed  upon.  The  object  is  either  to 
paralyse  or  disintegrate  the  enemy's  command,  which  may  be 
carried  out  by  four  acts,  separate  or  combined.  These  four 
acts  are : 

(i.)  Surprise.  An  enemy  may  be  surprised,  which  implies 
that  he  is  thrown  off  his  balance.  This  is  the  best  method  of 
defeating  him,  for  it  is  so  economical,  one  man  taking  on  to  him- 
self the  strength  of  many.  Surprise  may  be  considered  under 
two  main  headings  :  surprise  effected  by  doing  something  that 
the  enemy  does  not  expect,  and  surprise  effected  by  doing  some- 
thing that  the  enemy  cannot  counter.  The  first  may  be  denoted 
as  moral  surprise,  the  second  as  material. 

(ii.)  Envelopment.  An  enemy  may  be  enveloped  and  so 
placed  at  a  severe  disadvantage.  Envelopment,  whether  ac- 
complished by  converging  or  overlapping,  presupposes  a  flank,  a 
flank  which  may  be  tactically  rolled  up,  or,  if  turned,  will  expose 
the  command  and  lines  of  communications  behind  it.  The  attack 
by  envelopment  is  a  very  common  action  in  war,  which  more  often 
than  not  has  led  to  victory. 

(hi.)  Penetration.  An  enemy's  front  may  be  penetrated  in 
order  directly  to  threaten  his  lines  of  communications  behind  it, 
or  to  hit  at  his  command,  or  to  create  a  flank  or  flanks  to  be 
enveloped.  Normally,  when  once  a  hostile  front  is  broken,  the 
two  sections  are  rolled  up  in  opposite  directions  to  each  other,  or 
one  is  held  while  the  other  is  hammered  ;  an  operation  which,  if 
carried  out  successfully,  usually  leads  to  a  total  disintegration  of 
the  enemy's  strength. 

(iv.)  Attrition.  An  enemy  may  be  worn  out  by  physical  and 
moral  action  ;  this,  though  the  usual  method  of  defeating  him,  is 
also,  frequently,  the  most  uneconomical  method,  for  the  process 
of  disintegration  is  mutually  destructive. 

Outside  these  four  grand  tactical  acts  of  battle  there  is  little 
to  be  learnt  in  grand  tactics. 


The  Science  and  Art  of  War  51 

Once  the  direction  of  the  decisive  attack  is  fixed,  the  grand 
tactical  plan  is  arrived  at  by  applying  the  principles  of  war  to 
the  conditions  under  which  war  has  to  be  waged ;  in  other  words, 
liberty  of  movement  has  to  be  gained.  Free  movement,  which  is 
the  object  of  all  strategy,  is  conditioned  not  only  by  impulse  but 
by  the  form  of  the  object  moved.  In  war,  the  will  of  the  com- 
mander is  the  impulse,  and  the  strategical  distribution  of  his 
army  the  form  of  the  military  projectile,  which  should  nor  malty, 
like  an  arrow-head,  be  triangular,  the  main  force  in  rear  of 
it  operating  like  the  shaft  behind  the  head.  Generally  this 
head  consists  of  an  advanced  guard  and  two  wings.  The  secret 
of  all  economical  military  formations  is  that  they  must  possess 
a  harmon}^  of  offensive  and  defensive  power  through  move- 
ment, movement  in  its  broadest  sense  being  "  locomobility," 
that  is  freedom  of  movement  in  all  directions. 

Liberty  of  movement  is  the  basis  of  liberty  of  action,  which 
is  a  compound  formed  out  of  superiority  in  the  elements  of  war. 
It  is  the  foundation  of  minor  tactics  and  consists  of  the  follow- 
ing values  : 

(  Superiority  of  will. 

(i.)  Man -  Superiority  of  endurance. 

(  Continuity  of  co-operation. 

(  Superiority  of  speed. 

(ii.)  Movement <J  Continuity  of  movement. 

(  Superiority  of  manoeuvre. 

(  Superiority  of  weapons. 

(hi.)  Weapon -J  Superiority  of  clinching. 

(  Superiority  of  fire. 

{Inferiority  of  target. 
Continuity  of  supply. 
Superiority  of  mobile  protection. 

These  must  not  only  be  mixed  but  amalgamated  if  liberty 
of  action  is  to  possess  a  practical  value.  Thus,  continuity  of 
ammunition  supply  is  useless  if  superiority  of  weapons  does 
not   exist ;    and  superiority  of  fire   is  useless  if  it  does  not 

4* 


52  The  Reformation  of  War 

produce  continuity  of  co-operation.  Liberty  of  action  does  not 
mean  moving  anywhere,  but  moving  according  to  plan.  It 
does  not  mean  acting  anyhow,  either  wholly  or  in  part,  but 
acting  harmoniously  towards  the  attainment  of  the  objective. 
The  relation  of  each  of  its  components  to  the  whole  of  its  com- 
ponents, as  represented  by  liberty  of  action  itself,  must  be 
dynamic.  Liberty  of  action  is  not  the  free  will  of  the  com- 
mander as  a  thing  in  itself,  but  the  harmonious  application  of 
the  principles  of  war  to  the  conditions  of  the  moment.  The 
conditions  formulating  the  lines  of  least  resistance,  and  the  will 
of  the  commander  progressing,  by  means  of  the  elements,  along 
these  lines  according  to  the  dictates  of  the  principles.  Liberty 
of  action  is  the  perfect  correlationship  between  the  elements 
and  conditions  by  means  of  the  principles.  It  is  not  so  much 
the  domination  of  one  will  over  another  as  the  adjustment  of 
one  will  according  to  the  other.  Liberty  of  action  is,  therefore, 
the  offspring  of  two  wills  rather  than  the  force  engendered  by 
one ;  it  is  the  analogy  of  two  opposites. 

In  an  arm}/,  as  a  whole,  liberty  of  action  is  expressed  in 
the  soul  of  the  team.  Each  separate  action  is  identified  with 
the  whole  action  of  the  army  and  not  as  a  part  of  the  whole ; 
it  is  a  psychic  power  and  not  an  organic  act.  It  is  manifested 
through  a  general  will,  a  general  endurance,  and  a  general  co- 
operation. It  seeks  action  through  a  general  mobility,  a  con- 
tinuity of  this  mobility  and  the  power  of  harmonizing  it  within 
itself.  It  attains  result  through  the  superiority  of  weapons, 
the  superiority  of  fire,  and  the  power  of  clinching,  which  it 
protects  by  the  inferiority  of  the  target  offered  to  the  enemy, 
the  continuity  of  supply  of  ammunition,  weapons,  means  of 
movement  and  men,  and  by  the  various  forms  of  protection, 
the  most  important  of  which  are  of  a  mobile  nature.  Finally, 
liberty  of  action  is  based  on  harmony  of  movement,  mental, 
physical  and  mechanical,  which  harmony,  in  itself,  constitutes 
the  energy  of  the  compound. 

If  the  nature  of  the  elements  of  war  is  understood,  and  if 
we  realize  what  is  meant  by  liberty  of  action,  it  must,  conse- 


The  Science  and  Art  of  War  53 

quently,  follow  that  there  are  both  correct  and  incorrect  offensive 
and  defensive  formations  for  weapons  within  units  and  for 
units  themselves.  I  have  already  pointed  out  that  the  organiza- 
tion of  every  unit  should  possess  stable  and  mobile  qualities. 
I  will  now  carry  this  analysis  one  step  further. 

In  an  attack,  the  first  question  to  ask  ourselves  is  :  how 
to  advance  ?  The  second  :  what  will  prevent  an  economical 
advance  ?  Here  again  the  old  problem,  of  how  to  give  blows 
without  receiving  them,  confronts  us.  The  clearance  of  obstacles 
to  movement  is  essential ;  consequently,  we  arrive  at  a  very 
common-sense  answer,  namely,  that — few  attacks  except  nor- 
mal attacks  are  likely  to  succeed ;  in  fact  a  normal  attack  should 
be  what  its  name  implies — an  attack  according  to  principles 
governed  by  conditions,  i.e.,  economical. 

Once  resistance  has  been  reduced  to  a  normal  condition  ; 
it  logically  follows  that  a  normal  formation  can  be  devised 
which  will  suit  this  condition,  and  that,  until  this  condition 
is  arrived  at,  no  formation  will  prove  economical. 

I  have  already  explained  that  movement  has  two  forms — 
the  approach  and  the  attack ;  consequently,  there  are  two  main 
formations  in  battle  : 

(i.)  The  approach  formation  :  The  fundamental  formation 
for  the  approach  is  one  which  will  combine  mobility  and  security 
with  potentiality  of  offensive  power. 

(ii.)  The  attack  formation :  The  fundamental  formation 
for  the  attack  is  one  which  will  enable  the  maximum  number 
of  weapons  to  be  used  with  fullest  effect. 

The  normal  approach  formation  is  the  column,*  and  the 
normal  attack  formation  is  the  line. 

Whether  an  offensive  be  carried  out  over  open  field  land 
or  against  a  strongly  fortified  position,  its  foundations  are  to 
be  sought  for  in  the  base  of  operations  from  which  the  attack 

*  The  smallest  column  is  the  infantry  section  in  single  file.  It  was  used 
by  Cyrus  and  Alexander  ;  it  was  revived  by  Sir  John  Moore,  forgotten,  and 
once  again  to-day  finds  its  place  in  infantry  tactics.  See  "  The  Procedure  of 
the  Infantry  Attack,"  by  the  writer,  R.U.S.I.  Journal,  January,  1914. 


54  The  Reformation  of  War 

is  launched.  In  the  past  this  base  has  been  considered  as  the 
original  starting  line,  and,  if  battles  can  be  won  in  a  single 
onslaught,  this  assumption  is  correct.  As  this  can  seldom  be 
done,  and  as  battles  normally  are  won  by  relays  of  attacks, 
each  relay  must  start  from  a  stable  base  ;  consequently  there 
must  be  a  base  of  operations  to  each  objective  requiring  a  fresh 
echelon  of  troops.  Each  echelon  and  each  wave  of  each  echelon 
must  be  sufficiently  self-contained  not  only  to  be  in  a  position 
to  capture  an  objective,  or  line  of  resistance,  but  to  hold  it, 
and  so  form  a  base  of  operations  for  the  echelon  or  wave  follow- 
ing it.  Further,  each  wave  must  be  protected  by  the  one  in 
front  of  it  as  well  as  those  behind  it  and  on  its  flanks,  and,  as 
the  first  wave  cannot  be  so  protected  and  the  last  is  frequently 
similarly  situated,  it  is  essential  that  the  leading  troops  and  those 
which  will  form  the  ultimate  battle  front  should  be  drawn  from 
a  corps  d' elite,  the  former  setting  the  example  and  the  latter 
instilling  confidence. 

Having  now  explained  what  I  mean  by  a  progressive  base 
of  operations,  I  will  examine  the  action  developed  from  this 
base.  First,  we  have  got  to  assemble  the  troops  ;  secondly, 
these  troops  have  got  to  approach  towards  the  enemy  ;  thirdly, 
they  have  got  to  attack  him,  and  fourthly,  destroy  him  physically 
or  morally.     Here  we  obtain  four  minor  tactical  acts  : 

(i.)  The  assembly. 

(ii.)  The  approach. 

(hi.)  The  attack. 

(iv.)  The  pursuit. 

The  first  is  preparatory  to  the  second,  the  second  to  the 
third  and  the  third  to  the  fourth. 

The  attack  may  be  divided  into  two  stages  according  to 
whether  missile  or  shock  weapons  are  used.     These  are  : 

(i.)  The  act  of  demoralization  (fire  fight). 

(ii.)  The  act  of  decision  (shock). 

The  act  of  annihilation  or  pursuit  is  virtually  a  new  attack 
requiring  fresh  troops  and  troops  of  a  more  mobile  nature  to 
those  pursued.     To  summarize  : 


The  Science  and  Art  of  War  55 

A  battle  is  an  enormously  complex  action  consisting  of  a 
number  of  simple  parts.  First,  we  must  grasp  the  conditions, 
and,  by  so  doing,  ride  the  course.  We  then  must  take  all  the 
conditions  which  we  know  and  weigh  out  their  values  in  terms 
of  assistance  and  resistance.  Those  we  do  not  know  but  sus- 
pect we  must  consider  even  more  carefully  than  those  we  know, 
allowing  for  a  considerable  margin  of  error,  and  always  giving 
the  benefit  of  doubt  to  the  enemy. 

Having  collected  and  codified  these  conditions,  we  must 
next  apply  to  them  the  principles  of  war.  We  must  decide 
upon  our  objective,  applying  the  offensive  to  those  conditions 
which  will  assist  us  and  security  to  those  which  will  not  ;  thus 
shall  we  master  conditions  and  harness  them  to  our  will.  We  then 
think  in  terms  of  concentration,  of  economy  of  force,  of  move- 
ment and  surprise ;  finally,  we  weave  the  whole  together  in  a 
close  co-operation. 

By  now  our  battle  plan  will  have  evolved  almost  unconsciously, 
and  our  plan  is  our  grand  tactics. 

From  this  point  we  think  purely  in  terms  of  fighting ;  the 
skeleton  is  complete,  all  that  now  remains  to  be  done  is  to  clothe 
it  with  flesh  and  muscle — the  elements  of  war.  We  think  in 
terms  of  men,  movement,  weapons  and  protection.  What  are 
they  all  going  to  do  ?  Then  human  and  animal  endurance 
and  communications,  protection  by  armour,  earth,  fire  and 
formation.  All  these  give  us  our  battle  tactics.  Then,  there 
is  the  battle  itself,  in  which  the  moral  and  physical  powers  of 
man  come  into  play.  The  approach  merges  into  the  attack, 
and  the  offensive  and  defensive  powers  of  weapons,  shielded 
by  direct  and  indirect  protection,  carry  the  man  forward.  Such 
is  battle  and  such  is  war — a  science  and  an  art  based  on  sure 
foundations,  rooted  fast  in  the  past,  with  its  boughs  and  leaves 
moving  this  way  and  that  above  and  around  us  according  to 
the  conditions  of  the  moment,  but  governed  by  the  laws  of 
existence — action  and  inertia. 


Ill 

THE    ETHICS   OF   WAR 

THE  ethics  of  war  is  a  subject  which  in  the  past  has  not 
been  very  carefully  considered,  and  yet,  without  a  just 
comprehension  of  it,  it  is  quite  impossible  to  sift  the  virtues  of 
war  from  its  vices.  Hitherto,  and  from  time  immemorial,  there 
have  existed  two  opposite  ethical  schools  of  military  thought — the 
peace-mongers  and  the  war-mongers.  To  the  first,  war  appears  as 
the  greatest  of  calamities  and  to  the  second,  a  beneficial  necessity. 
Both,  in  the  main,  dislike  war,  but  while  the  first  seek  its 
abolition  through  concord  and  disarmament,  the  second  aim 
at  its  restriction  through  threat  and  preparation.  In  my  own 
opinion  there  is  right  and  wrong  on  both  sides,  for  nothing  in 
this  world  is  absolutely  good  or  absolutely  evil,  and  the  mere 
fact  that  in  war  an  enormous  energy  is  expended  should  lead 
every  thinking  man  to  suppose  that,  even  if  in  the  past  this  energy 
has  been  chiefly  made  use  of  for  purposes  of  destruction,  there  may 
be  some  hidden  path  along  which,  should  it  be  directed,  prosperity 
in  place  of  calamity  will  result.  With  this  idea  before  me,  it  is 
my  intention  in  this  Chapter  not  so  much  to  seek  this  path  as 
to  examine  the  values  of  war,  for  when  once  these  are  discovered 
the  path  itself  should  in  the  main  become  apparent. 

Starting  with  an  assumption  that  wars  are  an  inevitable 
constituent  of  human  progress,  an  assumption  I  have  examined 
in  Chapter  L,  I  will  first  inquire  into  the  ethical  objective  of 
nationality,  for  on  this  objective  must  the  true  military  ethical 
aim  be  founded,  because  military  might  is  but  a  means  of  enforcing 
national  policy. 

56 


The  Ethics  of  War  57 

The  science  of  ethics  is  the  science  of  duty  collective  and  in- 
dividual. The  duty  of  a  nation  is  to  survive ;  first,  with  profit 
to  itself,  and  secondly,  with  profit  to  humankind  ;  by  which 
is  meant  that  each  succeeding  generation  should  intellectually, 
morally  and  physically  be  superior  to  the  generation  which  begat 
it.  Ethics  teach  men  their  duties  not  only  towards  each  other 
but  towards  themselves,  and  it  is  upon  these  duties  that  national 
stability  is  founded. 

Race  survival,  or  the  struggle  for  existence  between  the 
weaker  and  the  stronger,  breeds  cunning  and  co-operation,  without 
which  a  nation  must  retrogress.  Either  the  weaker  in  body 
must  become  more  cunning  (mentally  able)  in  mind,  or  else 
they  must  unite  co-operatively  in  order  to  survive.  Conse- 
quently, weakness,  as  well  as  strength,  possesses  qualities  of 
virtue  and  vice.  Virtue,  ethically,  being  defined  as :  those 
conditions  which  enable  a  race  to  survive,  and  vice  as :  those 
which  accelerate  its  decline  and  hasten  its  extinction.  Virtue 
and  vice  are,  therefore,  purely  relative  qualities,  they  are  in  no 
wise,  in  the  Kantian  sense,  "  categorical  imperatives,"  but, 
in  place,  improvised  factors  conditioned  according  to  local 
requirements.  What  is  virtuous  to-day  may  be  vicious  to- 
morrow, and  what  is  vicious  in  the  Antipodes  may  simultaneously 
be  virtuous  in  the  land  of  the  Hyperborians. 

Opposition,  which  presupposes  weakness,  is  the  incentive 
of  mental  progress  both  in  the  individual  and  in  the  race,  for  it 
constitutes  the  inhospitable  region  in  which  intellect  must  strive 
to  live  and  either  dominate  or  succumb.  Mind  rights  muscle 
(superiority  of  human  strength  or  numbers)  with  weapons  of 
cunning  which  frequently  turn  conditions  to  the  favour  of  the 
physically  weak  or  outnumbered.  Ethics  have,  therefore,  little 
to  do  with  moral  customs  established  by  majorities  but  much 
with  the  psychology  of  mind. 

I  have  shown  in  Chapter  I.,  how  cunning  threatens  the  existence 
of  the  strong — the  cunning  savage  of  primeval  days  lures  his 
adversary  away  from  security  and  kills  him  unawares.  I  also 
pointed  out  that  this  cunning,  as  a  mean  effort  to  survive,  becomes 


58  The  Reformation  of  War 

repellant  to  the  strong.  It  is  stamped  as  ignoble,  for  a  scrofulous 
cripple  may  kill  an  athlete.  The  idea  of  the  human  louse  arises, 
an  individual  living  on  the  mental  deficiency  of  his  neighbours, 
and  the  growth  of  this  organism  is  restricted  by  laws  and  ethical 
codes.  Inversely,  prowess  is  endowed  with  a  nobility  of  character, 
for  upon  prowess  is  the  physical  health  of  the  family  or  race 
founded,  progeneration  being  a  physical  and  not  a  mental 
act. 

From  prowess,  especially  the  prowess  of  the  male  as  he  finds 
favour  in  the  eyes  of  the  female,  is  born  the  instinct  of  self- 
distinction,  the  personal  ethical  factor,  which  evolves  into  the 
collective  ethical  factor  when  it  merges  into  race-distinction,  and, 
eventually,  into  race-pride  and  patriotism. 

If  we  inquire  into  the  nature  of  these  factors  we  shall  find 
many  components,  some  transient  and  some  permanent.  Of 
the  latter,  the  bulk  may  be  placed  under  one  common  heading  : 
the  greatest  ethical  virtue  or  factor  of  either  the  individual 
or  the  nation  being  "  common-sense." 

The  means  of  attaining  the  ethical  objective  of  a  nation  is 
therefore  common-sense.  Honesty  is  common-sense ;  truth- 
fulness is  common-sense ;  courage  is  common-sense,  because 
all  these  qualities  assist  in  the  survival  of  individuals  and  the 
race,  and  not  only  in  survival  but  survival  with  profit  through 
co-operation  based  on  mutual  confidence,  trust  and  respect. 

The  reverse  of  common-sense  is  common-nonsense,  a  factor 
far  too  little  appreciated.  Thus  a  society  in  which  every  man 
lies  is  a  nonsensical  society ;  so  equally  is  one  in  which  every 
man  steals  or  every  man  cohabits  with  his  neighbour's  wife. 
Nonsensical  periods,  at  times,  sweep  over  a  nation  just  as  they  do 
over  an  individual,  especially  during  the  periods  of  youth  and 
decay  (change).  A  Spirit  of  comic  opera,  tragic  enough  to  the 
actors  but  laughable  to  the  onlookers,  will  sometimes  possess  an 
entire  nation.  They  stamp  out  their  intellect  in  a  social  delirium 
tremens,  the  product  of  imbibing  strong  doctrines  to  excess. 
They  conscript  their  labour,  socialise  their  women,  and  then, 
after  an  ebullition  of  liberty,  equality  and  fraternity,  whatever 


The  Ethics  of  War  59 

these  intoxicants  may  mean,  grab  from  each  other  whatever 
is  left  of  their  past  prosperity  and  revert  to  honesty,  truthfulness 
and  moral  conduct,  because  without  these  ethical  factors  it  would 
be  impossible  for  them  to  survive.  They  must  either  succumb 
to  common-sense  or  perish  nonsensically ;  this  is  the  ethical 
law  of  survival. 

If  ethics  be  defined  as  "  the  science  of  duty,"  and  duty, 
from  its  national  aspect  be  defined  as  "  the  obligation  to  survive 
with  profit,"  then  ethics  may  be  considered  as  the  psychological 
aspect  of  biology,  that  is  the  science  of  life.  Life  never  ceases 
to  change,  and,  if  ethics  be  a  branch  of  this  science,  it,  conse- 
quently, must  be  dynamic  in  nature,  that  is  it  must  ceaselessly 
change  coincidently  with  changes  in  man  and  in  the  society  to 
which  man  belongs. 

A  moment's  consideration  will  reveal  to  us  that  the  motive 
powers  in  man  are  either  instinctive  or  acquired,  the  former 
being  far  more  stable  than  the  latter ;  so  also  in  ethics  do  we 
find  a  similar  division.  Psychologically,  the  instinctive  qualities 
originate  from  the  instinct  of  self-preservation  and  the  acquired 
from  innumerable  artificial  conceits  springing  mainly  from  that 
of  self-distinction — the  outer  manifestation  of  the  preservative 
qualities  in  the  individual  or  race.  The  strong  man  advertises 
his  strength  brutally,  he  breaks  the  neck  of  a  bull ;  the  weak 
man's  cunning  slays  the  brute  with  a  sharp  flint  or  bullet.  By 
openly  demonstrating  what  each  can  do,  they  mutually  teach 
the  other  their  respective  deficiencies  and  so  exaggerate  their 
intrinsic  ability  by  swelling  it  with  the  admiration  or  envy  of 
those  who  watch  them,  and,  consequently,  add  moral  power  to 
their  physical  or  mental  strength. 

In  ethics,  the  process  is  very  similar.  We  start  with  foun- 
dational or  stable  ethics,  those  based  on  the  instinct  of  self- 
preservation  ;  we  progress  through  these  codes  to  those  of  collec- 
tive or  social  health,  and  through  these  to  the  codes  of  dynamic 
ethics,  or  the  ethical  comments  arising  through  the  mobility 
of  changefulness  in  ratiocination  and  local  circumstances. 
These,  originating  as  unwritten  rules  of  procedure,  crystallize 


60  The  Reformation  of  War 

into  customs  and  become  petrified.  Thence  arise  the  internecine 
conflicts  between  instincts  and  acquirements — the  social  skeleton 
tries  to  shake  off  the  withered  flesh. 

Thus,  ethics  may  grow  from  a  duty  into  a  compulsion  and 
evolve  into  a  series  of  penal  codes  by  which  society  is  imprisoned 
and  against  which  creative  thought  within  society  is  ever  striving, 
until,  like  a  bodily  fever,  it  sloughs  the  no  longer  sentient  skin 
in  a  war  of  purgation.  Ethics  in  the  form  of  copy-book  virtues 
are,  therefore,  a  cause  of  war — wars  of  liberation  which  racially 
are  endemic  in  character,  that  is  contagious.  One  nation  catching 
the  psychological  bacillus  of  liberty  from  another,  is  cast  into  a 
delirium  in  which  the  ossified  ethical  codes  become  mere  "  scraps 
of  paper,"  social  scabs,  things  to  be  torn  up  and  scratched  at 
by  the  instincts  which  are  again  freed  from  restriction.  As 
restrictions  no  longer  exist,  they,  like  wild-fire,  flow  out  athwart 
civilization  and,  on  occasion,  do  not  stay  their  fury  until  they 
have  utterly  consumed  it. 

Ethics,  as  customs,  manners,  conventional  morals  and 
fashions,  are,  when  in  a  healthy  state,  mobile  in  nature.  To 
discover  whether  any  of  these  transient  virtues  are  growing 
vicious  simply  requires  the  application  of  common-sense.  That 
is,  a  comparison  should  be  made  between  the  effects  of  the  doubtful 
virtue  and  the  ethical  objective — survival  with  moral  profit, 
any  deficiency  being  made  good  by  action  adapted  to  circum- 
stances. Unfortunately,  as  common-sense  is  the  rarest  of  all 
the  senses,  this  simple  process  of  gauging  the  temperature  of  the 
social  body  by  this  ethical  thermometer  is,  more  often  than  not, 
attempted  by  legal  casuistry  and  a  reshuffling  of  letters  and 
words  :  an  action  which  would  do  credit  to  an  Assyrian  sorcerer 
yelling  barbarous  names  at  the  moon. 

Besides  those  codes  of  morals  which  stimulate  or  restrict 
the  evolution  of  the  race,  innumerable  traditions  exist  both  as 
stimulants  and  as  narcotics.  The  power  of  tradition  is  immense, 
both  as  a  beneficial  influence  and  as  a  malevolent  one,  according 
to  its  relationship  to  circumstances. 

Normally    the  origin  of  a  tradition  is  to  be  sought  for  in 


The  Ethics  of  War  61 

some  successful  individual  action  which  has  resulted  in  a  better- 
ment— intellectual,  moral  or  material.  Success  depends,  to  a 
very  great  extent,  on  creative  brain  power  and  opportunity, 
which  is  nothing  less  than  the  exploitation  of  existing  circum- 
stances by  existing  means.  This  cause,  as  far  as  the  individual 
is  concerned,  is  temporary  in  nature.  With  a  man's  death  his 
creative  energy  ceases,  circumstances  change  and  his  theories 
of  success  lose  their  applicability. 

In  the  individual,  common-sense  usually  succeeds  in  pruning 
out  dead  personal  traditions,  because  the  individual  nearly  always 
possesses  creative  power  of  thought.  The  individual  has  to  live 
on  his  own  ability  and  energy,  and,  as  an  individual,  he  generally 
refuses  to  commit  suicide  by  adhering  to  the  obsolete  traditions 
of  his  family  ;  besides  this,  these  traditions,  being  for  the  most 
part  unrecorded,  die  with  their  begetters.  This  is,  however,  far 
from  being  the  case  when  traditions  spring  from  collective  acts 
or  are  absorbed  by  congeries  of  men.  To  the  crowd  the  novel  is, 
more  frequently  than  not,  the  heterodox,  because  the  crowd 
possesses  little  or  no  power  of  reason,  and  acts  of  individual 
ability  irritate  and  insult  it  by  diverging  from  what  it  accepts 
unthinkingly  as  established  truths.  These  collective  traditions 
grow  into  static  and,  frequently,  meaningless  shibboleths,  which 
the  receptively-minded  accept  without  criticism,  because  they  do 
not  possess  the  ability  to  formulate  it.  They  grow  into  vested 
interests  and  prejudices  which  clog  all  progress.  He  who  has 
does  not  wish  to  part  with  what  he  has,  even  if  it  be  but  an 
irrational  idea,  and  the  more  he  is  induced  to  part  with  it, 
the  more  prejudicial  does  he  become.  He  fights  the  new  idea, 
he  slanders  it,  he  anathematizes  it,  for  progress  is  unpalatable 
to  his  static  taste.  He  wishes  to  be  left  alone  and  do  what  his 
father  and  grandfather  did  before  him,  for  what  he  has  inherited, 
however  rotten  it  may  be,  is  a  personal  and  treasured  possession, 
it  is  part  of  himself,  for  acquisitiveness  is  an  instinct  in 
man. 

When,  in  place  of  the  individual,  the  crowd  is  considered, 
these  vested  interests  and  prejudices  become  deeply  rooted  in  its 


62  The  Reformation  of  War 

nature,  and  in  no  assemblies  is  this  more  apparent  than  in  those 
which  represent  religious  orders,  political  denominations  and 
military  castes.  Leaving  the  first  out  of  account,  I  will  examine 
the  remaining  two  because  they  are  closely  related,  every  civilized 
army  being  managed  by  a  political  department  of  the  government 
of  the  nation  to  which  it  belongs. 

State  departmental  rule,  I  will  assert  before  I  prove  it,  is 
a  system  of  management  normally  founded  on  common-nonsense, 
or  upon  action  adapted  to  traditions  in  their  static  forms  of 
interests  and  prejudices.     What  do  we  see  ? 

A  body  of  men  precipitated  into  office  from  the  test  tubes 
of  examinations  which,  at  best,  only  prove  the  blotting-paper 
nature  of  their  brains — their  power  of  absorbing  ink  visually. 
Once  deposited  alembic-like  on  an  office  stool,  the  official 
process  of  mental  distillation  begins.  A  fixed  salary  sterilizes 
their  creative  powers  ;  promotion  by  seniority  demonstrates 
to  them  the  uselessness  of  ability  and  the  value  of  senility,  and 
the  prospects  of  a  pension  and  the  possibilit}/  of  losing  it,  should 
they  court  disfavour,  shackle  and  gag  them — mind,  nerve  and 
jaw.  They  become  monks  in  a  monastic  institution  and  repeat 
rituals  which  have  lost  their  meaning,  magical  mantras  which 
render  their  thoughts  comatose  to  all  reality  beyond  their  files. 
They  grow  in  strength  and  breed  families  called  sub-departments  ; 
fill  these  with  branch  memoranda,  which  are  revolved  in  never 
ceasing  revolution  like  the  prayer-wheels  of  the  Mahayana 
Buddhists.  It  is  so  easy,  so  soothing,  so  absolutely  safe — thus 
time,  the  controlling  factor  in  life,  is  drowned  in  a  sea  of  ink. 

Then  one  day,  these  Trappists,  fat  on  mental  indolence,  are 
awakened  into  the  reality  of  a  common-sense  life  outside  them 
by  seditions  among  those  on  whom  they  have  successfully  eked 
out  their  anaemic  existence.  War  is  in  men's  minds  ;  creative 
thought  is  stalking  through  the  land  ;  the  race  instincts  are  once 
again  abroad.  But  the  monks  cannot  see  them  in  their  true 
form.  In  place  they  see  devils,  and  horrified  they  return  to  their 
files,  splash  ink  and  rotate  their  wheels  with  as  unchaste  a  frenzy 
as  tame  mice  in  a  rotary  cage.     Thus  are  great  nations  periodically 


The  Ethics  of  War  63 

inflicted  with  a  fever  by  the  insanitary  mental  conditions  of 
their  government  departments,  their  political  incantations,  their 
prayer-wheels,  their  files,  their  ink  and  their  lack  of  human- 
touch. 

In  the  armies  of  most  modern  States,  we  find  the  same  cramping 
influence  of  tradition  at  work  and  due  to  the  same  causes  : 
fixed  pay,  promotion  by  seniority  and  mental  emasculation  by 
pensions.  There  is  little  or  no  incentive  to  creative  thought 
and  every  incentive  to  remain  static.  The  whole  atmosphere 
is  unethical,  that  is  unprogressive  ;  consequently,  soldiers  become 
monastic  in  mind  ;  they  think  in  meaningless  shibboleths,  perform 
unintelligible  rituals,  and  base  their  duties  on  established  rules 
and  the  dotting  of  an  "  i  "  elaborately  legislated  for  in  some 
obscure  and  rigid  regulation.  They  are  Homoiousians  or  Homo- 
ousians  in  thought.  The  result  of  this  is  that  it  is  not  age  which 
renders  them  impotent  to  the  realities  of  war,  but  the  gelding- 
knife  of  fixed  ideas.  Their  thinking  power  is  rendered  sterile 
by  the  darkness  of  unreality.  Like  weeds  growing  in  a  cellar, 
so  do  armies  become  lank  and  lean  in  mind  and  colourless  in 
intellect  by  gazing  at  the  walls  of  the  mental  dungeons  in  which 
they  are  imprisoned. 

Common-sense  is  again  the  remedy,  common-sense  which 
replaces  common-nonsense  and  which  asks :  "  What  is  the 
object  of  war  ?  "  And  which  answers :  "  The  security  of 
existence,  prosperity  and  honour  by  the  fullest  exploitation  of 
the  people  and  their  resources."  As  long  as  this  common-sense 
question  is  not  asked  by  the  nation  and  the  answer  demanded 
of  its  army,  so  long  will  this  army  remain  an  immoral  association, 
that  is  one  which  does  not  fulfil  or  guarantee  the  ethical  needs 
of  the  people.  Salvation  is  through  common-sense,  which  should 
be  the  supreme  canon  and  law  of  the  military  hierarchy. 

During  periods  of  stress,  such  as  war,  the  character  of  a  nation 
reveals  itself.  If  the  war  be  unimportant,  its  loss  may  not 
materially  affect  the  nation,  yet,  nevertheless,  it  will  be  a  blow 
registered  against  its  prestige,  its  moral  capital  upon  the  stability 
of  which  so  much  of  its  material  prosperity  is  founded.     Its 


64  The  Reformation  of  War 

credit  will  be  lowered  in  the  eyes  of  others,  and  a  series  of  such 
blows  may  exhaust  the  national  moral  to  such  an  extent  that 
the  prestige  of  the  nation  is  laid  bare  to  a  knock-out  blow.  If 
the  war  be  important,  victory  becomes  vital,  and  the  nation 
subconsciously  realizing  this,  sets  to  work  to  divest  itself  of 
the  formalities  of  everyday  life.  Traditions  one  by  one  are 
discarded  and  replaced  by  common-sense  actions,  and,  as  this 
process  grows,  the  great  stable  and  foundational  race  ethics 
reveal  themselves,  and  the  nation  stands  or  falls  on  its  character, 
to  which  is  intimately  related  the  justice  of  its  cause. 

Thus  are  the  ethics  of  race  progress  frequently  refined  by 
war  by  being  liberated  from  the  jargon  of  meaningless  shibboleths, 
the  small-talk  of  politics  and  the  strangling  customs  of  bygone 
ages.  War  sweeps  these  aside  like  a  storm  of  rain  cleansing  the 
foul  streets  of  a  dirty  city.  The  process  is  uncomfortable, 
especially  for  those  who  are  caught  in  the  storm,  but  the  result  is 
the  reinvigoration  of  the  race  through  the  self-revelation  of  its 
character.  It  finds  that  it  possesses  something  more  precious 
than  conventions,  grades,  rules  and  regulations.  It  finds  that, 
though  these  under  certain  conditions  are  inevitable,  they  are 
not  essential,  and  to  be  purged  from  them,  even  but  for  a  time, 
is  a  stimulus  to  the  national  health.  It  finds  that  it  has  a  will 
to  accept  self-sacrifice  and  a  soul  above  the  pettiness  of 
peace. 

War  is  a  great  physician,  a  great  medicine,  a  great  purge. 
As  the  body  of  man,  unless  his  body  be  exceptionally  well 
regulated,  requires  an  occasional  aperient — a  dose  of  calomel, 
so  does  a  nation  require  an  occasional  war  to  free  it  from  the 
costiveness  of  traditions ;  and,  if  foreign  wars  be  rendered 
impossible,  then  Nature  will  simply  replace  them  by  internal 
revolutions.  Thus  we  see  that  war  may  sometimes  become  an 
ethical  factor  of  great  value.  This  being  so,  I  will  now  consider 
the  nature  of  the  ethical  object  of  war. 

As  the  military  object  of  war  is  to  defeat  the  enemy,  and  as 
the  economic  object  is  to  add  to  the  prosperity  of  the  nation,  so 
is  the  ethical  object  to  enhance  the  national  character,  that  is 


The  Ethics  of  War  65 

to  increase  its  respect  in  the  eyes  not  only  of  the  enemy  but  of 
neutral  nations.  A  man  who  fights  cleanly  is  always  applauded 
even  if  he  lose  ;  consequently,  under  certain  circumstances,  it  is 
even  more  important  to  win  the  ethical  objective  than  the  military 
one  ;  these  circumstances  depending  almost  entirely  on  the  men- 
tality of  the  combatants.  If  their  ideals  be  of  a  material  nature 
then  the  military  objective  becomes  the  most  important ;  if  of 
a  moral,  then  the  ethical  objective  is  paramount. 

In  most  cases  the  endurance  of  a  war  is  based  on  the  ethical 
nature  of  its  cause.  If  race  survival  be  this  cause,  then  the 
war  is  founded  on  justice,  and,  as  justice  is  a  common-sense 
virtue,  whether  the  artificial  laws  and  customs  of  civilization 
prohibit  wars  or  not,  wars  will  continue,  for  the  greatest  of  all 
laws  is  the  unwritten  and  unwritable  law  of  self  and  racial 
preservation.  A  man  steals  another  man's  wife :  this  is  a 
definite  common-sense  injustice  in  a  community  where  the 
men  and  women  are  numerically  equal.  Should,  however, 
the  number  of  women  fall,  I  will  suppose,  to  half  that  of  the  num- 
ber of  men,  it  is  manifestly  unjust  to  the  race,  whatever  it  may 
be  to  the  individuals,  that  one  man  should  have  two  wives 
or  even  that  one  man  should  possess  one  wife.  Consequently 
wife-stealing  ceases  to  be  an  act  of  injustice  and  becomes  of 
necessity  a  natural  virtue  ;  for  the  strongest  and  most  cunning 
will  come  into  possession  of  the  women,  and,  consequently,  the 
race  will  prosper  through  an  act  which  may  be  classed  by  the 
weaker  party  as  one  of  the  grossest  injustice  and  immorality. 

So  also  in  war  is  the  ethical  process  very  similar  ;  justice 
depending  on  the  instincts  which  underlie  civilization  and  the 
conditions  which  surround  it,  and  not  on  the  conventions  whicn 
veneer  it.  If  a  war  be  waged  for  the  personal  benefit  of  in- 
dividuals, it  normally  will  prove  a  vicious  war,  but  if  for  the 
benefit  of  the  race,  a  virtuous  one  If,  further,  this  war  be  fought 
not  only  for  the  benefit  but  for  the  self-preservation  of  the  race 
fighting  it,  it  will  then  become  a  common-sense  war  of  necessity, 
that  is  a  righteous  war,  which  means,  to  refuse  to  wage  it  would 
be  the  grossest  act  of  national  immorality. 

5 


66  The  Reformation  of  War 

Great  wars  directed  towards  an  ethical  objective  may  conse- 
quently be  looked  upon  as  a  new  dispensation  which  breaks  up 
the  atheism  of  peace  begotten  by  long  periods  of  personal  in- 
dulgence in  place  of  racial  improvement.  Peace  solidifies 
customs,  and  customs  and  traditions  strangle  the  national  will. 
Then  comes  war  and  sweeps  these  aside ;  it  ploughs  through 
accepted  dogmas  and  roots  up  the  weeds  of  civilization,  preparing 
the  ground  for  the  next  and  better  crop.  War  proves  a  nation 
not  only  capable  of  mastering  its  enemies,  but  of  mastering 
itself ;  of  sacrificing  interests  and  prejudices  for  the  common 
good,  and  of  emerging  from  wrack  and  ruin,  sorrow  and  woe, 
cleaner  mentally  and  socially  than  before  the  sword  was  drawn. 

Wars  between  great  nations  seem  terrible  to  mean  little 
men,  men  meanly  brought  up  and  meanly  educated,  men  who  can 
only  see  great  things  in  a  mean  little  way.  But  indeed  such  wars 
are  grand  and  glorious  when  compared  to  the  hideous  strife  of 
mediaeval  man,  of  unorganized  mobs,  of  murderous  bullies,  and 
of  that  great  degenerate  scum  which  bubbles  up  upon  the  surface 
of  a  nation  at  every  crisis.  War  may  be  ghastly  or  sublime  ; 
it  is  both,  but  Nature  cares  neither  for  the  one  nor  for  the  other  ; 
she  orders  evolution,  and  evolve  we  must,  on  her  lines  and  not 
on  those  expectorated  by  some  decayed  pedagogue.  On  the 
lines  of  war,  in  which  a  nation  accumulates  the  wealth  of  the 
weak,  thus  are  the  strong  rewarded  ;  of  peace,  in  which  the  strong 
develop  their  spoil,  thus  are  the  cunning  recompensed ;  of 
commercial  war,  in  which  the  workers  accumulate  the  riches 
of  the  masters  ;  of  commercial  peace,  in  which  wealth  is  developed 
and  diffused  throughout  the  world.  Peace  in  decay  is  more 
terrible  than  even  a  war  of  wantonness  and  destruction,  as 
Carlyle  so  dramatically  exclaims  : 

"  Call  ye  that  a  Society,  cries  he  again,  where  there  is  no  longer 
any  Social  Idea  extant ;  not  so  much  as  the  Idea  of  a  common  Home, 
but  only  of  a  common  overcrowded  Lodging-house  ?  Where  each, 
isolated,  regardless  of  his  neighbours,  clutches  what  he  can  get, 
and  cries  '  Mine  !  '  and  calls  it  Peace,  because  in  the  cut-purse  and 
cut-throat  scramble,  no  steel  knives,  but  only  a  far  cunninger  sort, 
can  be  employed  ?  " 


The  Ethics  of  War  67 

When  this  type  of  peace  begins  to  asphyxiate  a  nation,  it  is 
time  to  press  our  swords,  however  rusty,  upon  the  grindstones 
of  war  and  cut  the  throat  of  the  wanton  who  has  deceived 
us. 

As  the  ethical  object  of  a  nation  is  to  gain  a  moral  or  common- 
sense  superiority  over  its  neighbours,  that  is  a  reputation  for 
honesty  and  fearlessness  in  all  their  many  forms,  it  stands  to 
reason  that  this  objective  must  be  maintained  when  peace  gives 
way  to  war,  unless  ethics  are  to  be  cast  overboard.  Normally, 
in  a  healthy  nation  there  should  be  no  break  in  policy ;  conse- 
quently, in  war  the  policy  of  rightfulness  must  be  continued 
without  interruption  if  an  ethical  profit  is  to  be  secured. 

In  the  past,  and  to  a  very  considerable  extent  at  present,  the 
traditional  methods  of  peace  have  not  been  based  on  a  policy  of 
rightfulness  but  on  one  of  compromise  between  what  nationally 
is  considered  good  and  evil.  Most  civilized  governments  have 
attempted  through  diplomacy  (the  object  of  which  should  be  to 
guarantee  and  safeguard  peaceful  prosperity  and  honour)  to 
divide  the  nations  which  surround  them  into  two  categories — 
future  friends  and  future  foes  (the  good  and  evil).  These  cate- 
gories have  then  been  subjected  to  a  diplomatic  bombardment, 
the  former  with  moralizing  impressions  and  the  latter  with  de- 
moralizing ones.  In  this  bloodless  contest  the  main  weapons 
have  been  the  newspapers  of  prospective  friends  and  foes,  over 
which  frequently  controlling  interests  are  obtained.  If  this 
unethical  process  of  waging  war  continues,  then,  at  a  near  date, 
we  may  find  that  one  nation  will  become  the  actual  owner  or 
hidden  controller  of  another  nation's  press,  and  that  the  words 
which  express  the  policy  of  an  enemy  are  thrust  down  the  throats 
of  ignorant  people  like  home-made  jam.  Words,  much  more  so 
than  thoughts,  are  omnipotent  among  crowds,  but  they  must  be 
intelligible,  and  if  the  difference  originating  with  Babel  can  be 
overcome  by  an  international  press,  the  nation  which  can  control 
its  interests  will  be  in  a  powerful  position  to  poison  the  minds  of 
its  selected  foes.  Such  action  as  this  I  believe  to  be  grossly 
immoral,  and  that,  in  place  of  its  reducing  the  incidence  of  war, 

5* 


68  The  Reformation  of  War 

it  will  greatly  increase  it,  especially  war  in  its  most  disastrous 
form,  namely,  civil  war. 

If  this  unethical  form  of  diplomacy  continue,  then  it  will 
follow  that  the  grand  strategy  of  the  nation,  that  is  the  utilization 
of  the  national  energies  for  purposes  of  war,  will  follow  suit. 
Thus,  if  it  be  discovered  that  a  nation's  mentality  is  represented 
by  10%  —  jy,  x  representing  his  possible  assets  and  y  his  probable 
deficits,  in  peace  time  a  prospective  adversary  might  so  direct  his 
grand  strategy  as  to  reduce  x  and  to  increase  y.  Thus,  if  one  of 
the  x's  represents  political  stability,  an  unscrupulous  nation 
might  attempt  to  reduce  this  power  for  war  by  sowing  seeds  of 
political  discord  in  its  competitor's  government.  If  one  of  the 
y's  be  social  unrest,  it  might  decide  to  increase  its  disruptive 
influence  by  stimulating  its  strength.  The  first  of  the  means 
whereby  to  accomplish  this  is,  as  I  have  already  stated,  the  con- 
trol of  the  victim's  press,  the  second  the  control  of  the  victim's 
banks.  The  former  constitutes  the  surest  means  of  disruption 
and  the  latter  the  surest  of  obtaining  information,  for,  of  all 
records,  a  nation's  pass-books  will  furnish  the  most  accurate 
source  of  information  regarding  the  lives  of  the  leaders  of  the 
victim  nation,  who  may,  consequently,  be  blackmailed  into 
declaring  war  or  maintaining  peace. 

The  above  processes  of  corrupting  a  nation's  "  will  to  win  ' 
by  depriving  him  of  the  "  power  to  will  "  during  days  of  peace  are, 
I  affirm,  both  immoral  and  Machiavellian,  and,  worse  still,  they  are 
foolish,  because,  in  place  of  enhancing  the  virtues  of  a  nation  which 
so  acts,  they  render  visible  its  own  vices.  No  man  of  worth  will 
trust  a  cheat,  a  bully,  or  a  cad,  however  skilful  and  successful  he 
may  be.  For  a  time  he  may  knuckle  under,  but  only  to  await  his 
chance  ;  then  he  will  turn  on  the  trickster  and  rend  him,  and  rightly 
he  will  show  no  mercy.  Rightfulness  begets  mercy  in  the  heart 
even  of  a  ferocious  enemy,  and  every  nation  should  remember 
that,  in  war,  it  may  be  defeated,  and  that,  if  defeated,  according 
to  its  past  deeds  it  will  be  judged  and  punished. 

In  spite  of  the  above  opinion,  war,  it  must  be  realized,  is  not  a 
tourney  but  a  life  struggle  for  existence  in  which  there  is  no  belt 


The  Ethics  of  War  69 

which  may  not  be  hit  under,  and,  as  long  as  traditional  diplomacy 
exists,  this  belt  will  be  hit  under,  for,  as  I  have  shown,  the  ethical 
objective  of  war  finds  its  origin  in  the  ethical  objective  of  the 
nation  during  the  peace  which  preceded  the  war.  In  type,  it  will 
follow  type,  though  the  tune  is  played  in  a  higher  octave. 

Should  the  ethical  outlook  of  the  nation  be  material  and  bar- 
barous, so  will  its  actions  in  war  be  material  and  barbarous  ; 
consequently,  to  blame  its  soldiers  for  acting  materially  or  brutally 
is  illogical,  for  they  are  but  the  instruments  of  the  policy  which 
has  been  established  by  the  nation  during  peace  time.  The  im- 
moralities of  war  are  normally  but  a  continuation  of  the  im- 
moralities of  peace.  Like  an  individual  soldier  or  an  army,  war, 
as  a  whole,  possesses  its  moral  side,  which  is  the  spiritual  expres- 
sion of  the  accumulated  impressions  that  each  individual  member 
of  the  nation  has  received  during  peace  time.  Consequently,  if 
wars  are  to  be  made  less  barbarous,  it  is  useless  restricting  the 
bodily  and  mechanical  activities  of  the  soldier,  for  these  are 
not  ends  in  themselves.  Instead,  the  spiritual  and  ethical  out- 
look of  the  nation  must  be  improved.  If  war  is  to  be  made 
less  brutal,  then  indeed  must  philanthropists  watch  the  cradles 
and  the  nursery  in  place  of  the  arsenals  and  the  barrack- 
room. 

Besides  the  ethical  object  of  the  war,  viewed  as  a  great 
national  benefit,  since  time  immemorial  war  has  had  its  tradi- 
tions and  customs  which  accelerate  or  retard  victory  according  as 
their  values  may  be  equated  in  terms  of  common-sense.  Thus, 
to  assassinate  prisoners  is  not  so  much  an  immoral  act  as  an  un- 
economical one.  If  prisoners  are  killed  off,  it  will  mean  that  the 
enemy  will  fight  to  the  death  ;  that  his  men  will  retaliate  by 
killing  the  prisoners  they  capture  ;  that  the  use  of  prisoners  as 
labourers  or  hostages  will  be  lost,  and  that  the  moral  effect  of  the 
savagery  resulting  will  upset  that  cool,  deliberate  determination 
which  is  so  necessary  in  order  to  control  the  actions  of  soldiers  on 
the  battlefield.  Assassination  is,  therefore,  quite  as  much  a  vice 
in  war  as  in  peace.  Thus  again,  the  sacking  of  towns  and  the 
killing  of  civilian  inhabitants  is  wrong,  unless  these  acts  can  find  a 


70  The  Reformation  of  War 

commensurate  compensation  of  real  military  value  ;  not  so  much 
because  they  entail  the  loss  of  property  and  life,  but  because  they 
lead  to  the  moral  disintegration  of  an  army  and  sow  seeds  of 
hatred  which  will  survive  the  war. 

It  must  not,  however,  be  forgotten  that,  while  a  few  years  ago, 
armies  alone  went  forth  to  battle,  to-day  entire  nations  go  to  war, 
not  only  as  soldiers  but  as  the  moral  and  material  suppliers  of 
soldiers.  This  being  so,  we  find  that,  while  a  short  time  back, 
it  was  clearly  possible  to  differentiate  between  the  military  and 
ethical  objectives  of  nations  at  war,  to-day  this  differentiation  is 
becoming  more  and  more  complex  ;  so  much  so,  that  both  these 
objectives  are  likely  to  coincide,  and,  when  this  takes  place,  to 
attack  the  civilian  workers  of  a  nation  will  then  be  as  justifiable 
an  act  of  war  as  to  attack  its  soldiers. 

The  ethical  traditions  of  war  have  little  to  do  with  the  paper 
customs  and  usages  manufacturered  by  elderly  and  talkative 
busy-bodies  in  the  quietude  of  philanthropic  debate,  but  much  with 
unwritten  acts  of  chivalry  which  refine  the  brutality  of  the  art. 
Many  of  these  acts  survive  to  grow  into  shibboleths  which  become 
astringents  to  victory.  Others,  more  stable  in  nature,  prove  true 
solvents  of  future  difficulties,  and  these,  as  might  be  expected,  are 
based  on  common-sense.  Chivalry,  in  the  broadest  meaning  of 
the  word,  is  the  cultivation  of  respect  in  an  enemy  for  or  by  his 
opponent.  Outstanding  acts  of  courage,  of  courtesy,  of  humanity, 
give  birth  to  a  feeling  of  superiority  or  inferiority  according  as  one 
side  excels  or  falls  short  of  the  other.  This  feeling  of  superiority, 
of  noblesse  oblige,  is  purely  ethical,  yet  it  forms  the  basis  of  the 
physical  superiority  which  victory  demands.  The  side  which,  in 
war,  first  attains  a  superiority  in  chivalry  is  the  side  which  attains 
a  spiritual  victory  over  its  enemy,  a  victory  which  normally  not 
only  precedes  a  material  success  but  which  wins  the  ethical  ob- 
jective of  war,  which  is  the  true  foundation  of  the  peace  which 
follows  it. 

These  acts  of  chivalry  arc  to  a  great  extent  individual  acts 
based  on  the  individual  culture  of  the  race.  An  army  of  gaol- 
birds, however  well  disciplined  it  may  be,  will,  on  the  battlefield 


The  Ethics  of  War  71 

revert  to  type  directly  restraint  is  released  ;  so  also  will  an  army 
of  cultured  men  ;  but  the  difference  between  these  two  types  is, 
that  while  in  the  former  case  the  soldier  reverts  to  a  criminal,  in 
the  latter  he  usually  continues  as  an  honourable  man,  for  honour 
is  part  of  his  permanent  status.  On  individual  acts  of  honour  is 
chivalry  founded. 

In  many  respects  war  may  be  compared  to  a  game.  It  has  its 
rules,  which  are  elastic  enough  to  be  of  general  application  ;  but 
there  is  this  difference.  While  in  a  game  the  referee  is  represented 
by  a  third  party,  a  disinterested  judge,  in  war  there  is  no  third 
party,  the  referee  being  replaced  by  the  conscience  of  the  com- 
batants themselves.  As  I  have  already  remarked,  there  is  no 
belt  which  may  not  be  hit  under  ;  nevertheless,  though  this  be  the 
case,  a  wise  fighter  will  think  twice  before  hitting  below  a  certain 
moral  line,  because  the  tactical  advantage  accruing  may  be  can- 
celled out  by  the  ethical  loss  resulting.  If  in  a  game  of  football, 
however,the  referee  abscond,  and  one  side,  arming  itself  with  sticks, 
assails  the  other,  it  would  be  ethically  and  competitively  wrong 
if  the  side  so  attacked  did  not  protect  itself.  Ethically  so  be- 
cause brutality  would  usually  triumph  ;  competitively,  because 
the  unarmed  side  would  inevitably  be  driven  from  the  field. 
In  such  circumstances  common-sense  again  holds  final  judgment, 
as  it  always  must ;  and  when,  in  its  accepted  forms  of  chivalry, 
it  can  no  longer  be  applied,  then  application  must  be  sought  for 
through  any  and  every  means  which  will  wipe  out  the  insult  of  a 
dishonourable  opposition.  Men  who  take  on  the  nature  of  vermin 
must  be  exterminated,  and  in  their  extermination  is  the  entire 
moral  progress  of  mankind  moved  one  step  nearer  its  final  and 
unknown  goal.  To  refuse  to  use  base  means  against  a  base  foe  is 
to  set  a  premium  on  crime,  and  in  war  there  are  crimes  as  well  as 
honours.  To  tolerate  crime  is  neither  to  act  chivalrously 
towards  a  criminal  or  chivalrously  towards  oneself ;  it  is  the  act 
of  a  fool,  that  is  of  a  man  who  values  his  self-preservation  at  the 
price  of  a  custom  which  ceasing  to  be  marketable  has  become 
counterfeit. 

Ultimately,  from  acts  of  chivalry  on  the  battlefield  do  we  soar 


72  The  Reformation  of  War 

to  those  acts  which  form  the  ethics  of  grand  strategy,  the  fuller 
meaning  of  which  I  will  discuss  in  Chapter  XI.  To  damage  a 
nation  morally  during  days  of  peace  is  not  good  enough  ;  it  is  but 
a  poor  endeavour,  which  normally  must  bring  but  little  profit. 
Ethically,  during  war,  as  I  will  show,  grand  strategy  does  aim  at 
demoralizing  the  enemy,  yet  also  does  it  consist  in  the  enhance- 
ment of  a  nation's  worth  in  the  eyes  of  its  actual  or  potential 
enemies.  Integrity,  honour,  justice  and  courage  are  the  weapons 
of  the  grand  strategist,  which  not  only  demonstrate  a  nation's 
moral  worth  but  its  martial  power.  The  cultivation  of  these  in 
peace  time  forms  the  backbone  of  success  in  war. 

As  long  as  war  is  looked  upon  as  a  calamity,  a  kind  of  inter- 
national influenza,  so  long  will  the  true  ethics  of  war  be  obscured. 
Up  to  the  present  it  has  been  of  necessity  calamitous,  for  the 
means  of  waging  war  have  been  means  of  destruction,  though  these 
means  have  shown  a  steady  improvement  since  the  days  when 
primitive  man  wielded  the  flint  axe.  I  will  show,  I  hope  quite 
clearly,  that  modern  science  has  now  placed  at  the  disposal  of  the 
soldier  means  which  it  was  totally  impossible  to  make  use  of  a  few 
years  ago,  and  that  these  means  will  humanize  war  and  raise  it 
from  its  present  barbarous  footing  to  a  higher  ethical  position. 
While,  in  the  past,  because  in  war  men  had  to  be  killed,  no  civi- 
lized soldier  has  suggested  that,  consequently,  nations  through 
their  peace  policy  should  aim  at  secret  assassination  ;  so  I  believe 
that,  in  the  future,  when  it  is  realized  that  the  most  humane 
method  of  waging  war  is  the  moral  attack  on  the  enemy's  nerves, 
no  civilized  soldier  will  suggest  that  the  peace  policy  of  war  should 
be  based  on  international  terror.  This  may  be  the  method  of 
atavistic  revolutionaries,  social  throwbacks  to  the  days  of  Nero, 
but  I  fervently  hope  that  they  will  not  be  countenanced  by 
soldiers  or  sane  politicians. 

For  these  views  to  be  accepted  by  armies,  there  must  be  a 
radical  change  in  their  political  and  military  mentality.  New 
ideas  must  be  considered  freely,  criticized  freely  and  judged 
publicly,  and  if  found  more  profitable  than  existing  ones — ac- 
cepted.    When  in  a  normally  healthy  family  a  child  is  born,  the 


The  Ethics  of  War  73 

parents  are  not  only  congratulated  but  are  proud  and  pleased  at 
the  event.  When,  however,  in  an  army  some  unfortunate  in- 
dividual gives  birth  to  a  new  idea,  he  is  execrated,  and  why  ? 
Because  any  new  idea  is  apt  to  disturb  the  vested  interests  and 
prejudices  which  bulk  so  large  in  military  organization.  It  is 
the  old  question  of  creative  thought,  the  irresistible  force,  seeking 
for  a  niche  in  the  stable  opinions  which  surround  it.  It  is  again 
the  old  question  of  the  selection  of  the  fittest  by  means  of  a 
struggle  between  fit  and  unfit. 

The  idea  is  the  child  of  circumstances  ;  it  does  not  spring 
fully  armed  from  a  single  head,  but  is  engendered  in  this  head  by 
the  rottenness  of  its  surroundings.  It  is  by  observing  rottenness 
that  purity,  or  improvement,  arises  ;  consequently,  the  lustiness 
of  the  rottenness  is  very  natural,  for  rottenness  is  also  striving 
to  endure. 

When  we  glance  through  military  history,  we  find  that  most 
new  ideas,  which  eventually  materialize  into  theories  or  concrete 
form,  originate  in  piratical  exploits  outside  the  existing  military 
organization,  and  that  only  after  a  period  of  virulent  abuse  do 
they  become  adjuncts  or  undesirable  foster-children  in  the 
military  family. 

The  idea  proves  its  value  and  its  champions  exaggerate  its 
powers.  Opinion  now  accepts  the  idea  under  the  covering  fire 
of  an  offensive  directed  against  the  exaggerations.  The  idea 
is  attached  to  the  traditional  elements  and  begins  to  consume 
them,  until  from  the  ashes  of  the  old  organization  arises  a  new, 
which  usually  proves  that  the  exaggerations  fall  totally  short 
of  the  full  development  of  the  idea.  Everyone  is  now  contented  ; 
the  originators  of  the  idea  because  they  have  actually  outstepped 
their  predictions  ;  the  old  school  also,  for,  after  all,  were  not  these 
predictions  incorrect  ?  Circumstances  having  proved  them  to 
have  fallen  sadly  short  of  the  mark.  The  new  idea,  consequently, 
is  accepted,  and,  under  the  new  school,  which  step  by  step  adopts 
the  mentality  of  the  old  school,  stabilizes,  and  in  its  turn  has  to 
be  broken  up  by  another  volcanic  eruption. 

It  is  now  my  intention  in  the  remaining  ten  Chapters  of  this 


74  The  Reformation  of  War 

book  to  place  a  few  new  ideas  before  the  reader,  so  that  he 
may  judge  whether  present-day  military,  naval  and  air  force 
organizations  are  the  best  in  order  to  maintain  or  enforce  policy, 
and  if  not,  whether  my  suggestions  are  better  or  worse.  If  better, 
then  I  trust  that  he  will  support  them,  for  our  present  defence 
forces  are  costing  £150,000,000  a  year. 


IY 

THE  LAST  LAP  OF  THE  PHYSICAL  EPOCH 

IN  this  Chapter  I  intend  examining  the  nature  and  character 
of  the  Great  War  of  1914-1918,  and  to  show  that,  tactically, 
it  was  based  on  a  gigantic  misconception  of  the  true  purpose 
of  war,  which  is  to  enforce  the  policy  of  a  nation  at  the  least  cost 
to  itself  and  enemy  and,  consequently,  to  the  world,  for  so  in- 
tricately are  the  resources  of  civilized  states  interwoven  that 
to  destroy  any  one  country  is  simultaneously  to  wound  all  other 
nations. 

In  August,  1914,  it  cannot  be  said  that  the  armies  of  Europe 
were  unprepared  for  war  ;  they  were  prepared,  and  to  the 
proverbial  last  gaiter  button.  But  for  what  kind  of  war,  this 
is  the  crucial  question  ? 

Ever  since  1866  and  1870,  the  eyes  of  the  General  Staffs  of 
Europe  had  been  blinded  by  the  brilliance  of  von  Moltke's 
strategy.  Soldiers  had  gazed  on  the  bayonet  points  of  Sadowa 
and  Sedan  until  they  were  hypnotized  by  these  great  battles, 
and,  under  the  influence  of  this  hypnosis,  they  dreamt  of  the 
next  war  as  an  immense  1870  operation  involving  unlimited 
slaughter. 

Their  doctrine  was  founded  on  two  tremendous  fallacies. 
First,  that  policy  is  best  enforced  by  destruction  ;  secondly, 
that  military  perfection  is  based  on  numbers  of  soldiers.  They 
did  not  realize  that  Sadowa  and  Sedan  were  won  by  the  weapons 
of  1866  and  1870.  That  these  weapons  had  long  been  replaced 
by  more  effective  ones.  That  during  the  forty  years  following  the 
capitulation  of  Paris,  science,  industry  and  means  of  transport 

75 


76  The  Reformation  of  War 

had  revolutionized  the  civilized  nations  of  the  world.  Not 
realizing  this  vast  change  in  the  conditions  which  would  surround 
the  next  war,  and  meditating  on  war  as  a  thing  in  itself,  as  an 
end  rather  than  as  a  means  towards  an  end,  the  General  Staffs 
of  Europe  calculated  the  respective  strengths  of  their  armies 
in  tons  of  human  flesh.  Then,  in  1914,  these  armies  marched 
after  phantoms  which,  like  will-o'-the-wisps,  led  them  to  the 
slaughter-houses  of  the  Grand  Couronne,  the  Marne,  Aisne,  and 
Ypres,  and,  at  length,  to  a  partial  realization  that  war  is  a  living 
art,  a  system  of  knowledge  and  action  which  must  be  fed  on  the 
civil  sciences  and  nurtured  on  the  civil  industries  in  order  to 
maintain  its  strength  and  purpose — the  enforcement  of  a  nation's 
policy  with  the  least  detriment  to  the  peace  which  must  follow 
final  victory. 

In  their  conservatism  and  lethargy  armies  are  indeed  extra- 
ordinary organizations.  Browsing  through  peace  time,  like 
human  cattle  they  are  slaughtered  during  war.  So  constituted 
that  ability  has  the  greatest  difficulty  to  struggle  to  the  top, 
the  selection  of  the  fittest  to  command  has  seldom  a  refining 
influence  on  their  constitutions  ;  consequently,  when  a  great 
Captain  does  arise,  irrespective  of  the  circumstances  which 
surrounded  his  successes,  his  system,  even  if  he  has  no  system, 
is  turned  into  an  infallible  doctrine,  a  dogma  which  becomes  a 
millstone.  Marshal  Saxe,  from  whose  works  I  have  already 
quoted,  realized  this  full  well  when  he  wrote  : 

"  Gustavus  Adolphus  invented  a  method  which  was  followed  by 
his  scholars  and  carried  into  execution  with  great  success  ;  but 
since  his  time  there  has  been  a  gradual  decline  amongst  us,  which 
must  be  imputed  to  our  having  blindly  adopted  maxims,  without 
any  examination  of  the  principles  on  which  they  are  founded  ;  .  .  . 
from  whence  it  appears  that  our  present  practice  is  nothing  more 
than  a  passive  compliance  with  customs,  the  grounds  of  which  we 
are  absolute  strangers  to." 

Such  was  the  military  outlook  before  the  Seven  Years'  War, 
and  such  was  the  military  outlook  in  July,  1914. 

From  1870  onwards,  a  new  civilization  had  arisen  in  Europe, 
based  on  the  enormous  growth  of  railways  and  the  facilities 


The  Last  Lap  of  the  Physical  Epoch         77 

rendered  possible  by  the  motor  car  and  lorry.  Soldiers  had 
studied  these  means,  not  in  order  to  mechanicalize  armies,  that 
is  to  replace  muscular  by  mechanical  power,  but  from  the  point 
of  view  that  these  means  of  movement  would  enable  an  enemy's 
frontier  to  be  submerged  under  a  veritable  inundation  of  flesh. 
Millions  of  men  would  sweep  forward  and,  like  immense  clouds 
of  locusts,  would  gain  victory  by  sheer  weight  of  numbers.  This 
doctrine  was  so  simple  ;  moreover  the  railway  appeared  to  render 
it  possible.     Hence  the  horde  armies  of  1914. 

The  strategist  had,  however,  forgotten  the  tactician.  No 
man  could  control  such  vast  numbers  of  men,  which,  in  France, 
formed  two  great  human  stop-butts.  This  was  a  colossal  error, 
but  not  the  biggest,  for  the  strategist  and  the  tactician  both 
forgot  human  nature. 

The  supreme  duty  of  the  soldier  is  to  fight  and  not  to  die. 
As,  in  1914,  armies  could  not  live  on  the  surface  of  the  battlefield, 
there  was  no  choice  but  to  go  under  the  surface  ;  consequently, 
trenches  five  hundred  miles  long  were  dug,  and  armies,  like  foxes, 
went  to  earth  ;  because,  since  1870,  the  magazine  rifle,  the 
machine  gun  and  the  quick-firing  field  cannon  had  replaced  the 
weapons  of  that  day.  Consequently,  the  tactics  of  Sedan  had 
been  rendered  quite  obsolete — almost  as  obsolete  as  the  electrical 
sciences  of  1870  would  be  if  compared  to  those  of  19 14. 

In  order  to  secure  these  trenches  from  surprise  attack,  each 
side  turned  itself  into  an  immense  spider,  and  spun  around  its 
entrenchments  hundreds  of  thousands  of  miles  of  steel  web — 
the  common  commercial  article  known  as  barbed  wire,  miles  of 
which  had  been  used  in  South  Africa,  in  1901,  and  hundreds  of 
miles  of  it  in  the  defences  of  Port  Arthur,  in  1904.  But  these 
wars,  especially  the  latter,  though  closely  studied  by  soldiers, 
were  examined  through  1870  spectacles,  and  their  tactical  lessons 
were  blurred  through  strategical  study.  Yet  one  man  at  least, 
though  not  a  soldier,  did  clearly  see  what  the  influence  of  modern 
weapons  on  the  traditional  methods  would  lead  to.  This  man 
was  Mr.  I.  S.  Bloch,  a  banker  in  Warsaw,  who,  in  1897,  published 
a  book  in  six  volumes  on  "  The  War  of  the  Future."     At  the  time, 


78  The  Reformation  of  War 

soldiers  derided  Mr.  Bloch's  ideas  and  deductions ;  a  wiser  pro- 
cedure would  have  been  to  have  read  his  work  and  to  have 
absorbed  a  little  knowledge.  In  the  English  translation  of  the 
last  volume,  which  was  published  in  1899  under  the  title  "  Is  War 
Impossible,"  Mr.  Bloch  writes  : 

"  At  first  there  will  be  an  increased  slaughter — increased  slaugh- 
ter on  so  terrible  a  scale  as  to  render  it  impossible  to  get  troops  to 
push  the  battle  to  a  decisive  issue.  They  will  try  to,  thinking 
that  they  are  fighting  under  the  old  conditions,  and  they  will  learn 
such  a  lesson  that  they  will  abandon  the  attempt  for  ever.  Then, 
instead  of  a  war  fought  out  to  the  bitter  end  in  a  series  of  decisive 
battles,  we  shall  have  as  a  substitute  a  long  period  of  continually 
increasing  strain  upon  the  resources  of  the  combatants.  The  war, 
instead  of  being  a  hand-to-hand  contest,  in  which  the  combatants 
measure  their  physical  and  moral  superiority,  will  become  a  kind  of 
stalemate,  in  which,  neither  army  being  willing  to  get  at  the  other, 
both  armies  will  be  maintained  in  opposition  to  each  other,  threaten- 
ing the  other,  but  never  being  able  to  deliver  a  final  and  decisive 
attack.  .  .  .  That  is  the  future  of  war — not  fighting,  but  famine, 
not  the  slaying  of  men,  but  the  bankruptcy  of  nations  and  the 
break-up  of  the  whole  social  organization.  .  .  .  Everybody  will 
be  entrenched  in  the  next  war.  It  will  be  a  great  war  of  entrench- 
ments. The  spade  will  be  as  indispensable  to  a  soldier  as  his 
rifle.  .  .  .  All  wars  will  of  necessity  partake  of  the  character  of 
siege  operations.  .  .  .  Your  soldiers  may  fight  as  they  please  ; 
the  ultimate  decision  is  in  the  hands  of  famine.   ..." 

The  above  constitutes  an  accurate  forecast  of  events  in 
1914-1917,  which  were  rehearsed  ten  years  previously,  on  a 
smaller  scale,  at  Nan  Shan,  Liao  Yang  and  Mukden.  Their 
deduction  was  a  matter  of  pure  common-sense.  Given  a  magazine 
rifle  firing  ten  aimed  rounds  a  minute,  a  machine  gun  firing 
five  hundred  rounds  and  a  field  gun  firing  ten  rounds,  even  in 
1904  it  was  beyond  question  that  the  tactics  of  1870  were  as 
unsuited  to  twentieth  century  weapons  as  the  machine  tools 
of  an  1870  workshop  would  be  unsuited  to  a  twentieth  century 
manufactory.  In  connection  with  this  criticism,  which  I  believe 
to  be  sound,  though  possibly  unpalatable,  I  will  hazard  to  quote 
two  personal  experiences.  In  April,  1914,  when  a  student  at 
the  Camberley  Staff  College,  I  had  occasion  to  visit  an  Artillery 


The  Last  Lap  of  the  Physical  Epoch         79 

Practice  Camp  at  Larkhill  (Salisbury  Plain),  and  so  struck  was 
I  by  the  power  of  the  quick-firing  field  gun  that  I  wrote  the 
following  : 

"  The  leading  lesson  which  I  learnt  whilst  at  this  camp  only- 
accentuated  what  reading  had  already  led  me  to  suppose,  namely, 
that  artillery  is  to-day  the  superior  arm,  and  that,  consequently, 
battles  will  become  more  static,  i.e.,  entrenched.  That  its  power 
is  so  great  that  the  infantry  assault  will  be  chiefly  rendered  possible 
by  the  demoralization  of  the  enemy  by  means  of  artillery  fire.  This 
logically  leads  to  penetration  in  place  of  envelopment  as  the  grand 
tactical  principle  of  the  attack,  because  freedom  of  manoeuvre  will 
be  limited  by  wire  and  field  works  ;  to  an  enormous  expenditure  of 
ammunition  at  the  decisive  point,  and  to  consideration  whether  a 
special  motor  ammunition  column  should  not  be  formed  to  supply 
alone  the  guns  taking  part  in  the  decisive  artillery  attack." 

This  deduction  was  not  accepted. 

During  the  same  month  I  wrote  a  memoir  on  the  tactics  of 
penetration*  in  which  I  considered  the  tactics  of  the  next  war. 
In  it  I  said  : 

'  To-day  we  have,  besides  the  magazine-rifle,  the  characteristics 
of  which  are  understood,  two,  comparatively  speaking,  new  weapons  : 
the  quick-firing  field  gun  and  the  machine  gun.  Realizing  this, 
we  can  predict  with  absolute  certainty  that  the  general  who  makes 
the  truest  use  of  these  weapons,  that  is  so  deploys  his  men  that  their 
fullest  power  is  attained,  will  win,  unless  he  is  hopelessly  outnumbered. 
If  this  general  further  devise  a  system  of  deployment  which  will 
not  only  accentuate  the  power  of  these  weapons,  but  also  the  defects 
in  his  opponent's  formation,  he  will  win  irrespective  of  numbers, 
as  surely  as  1,400  Swiss  beat  15,000  Austrians  at  Mortgarten,  and  as 
surely  as  90,000  Austrians  were  beaten  by  33,000  Prussians  at 
Leuthen.     This  is  a  certainty. 

"  From  1840  to  the  close  of  the  nineteenth  century,  improve- 
ments steadily  forced  the  rifle  to  the  fore.  A  similar  progress  did 
not  take  place  in  the  manufacture  of  cannon,  breech-loading  guns 
not  being  finally  adopted  by  the  British  Army  until  1886.  By  the 
beginning  of  the  present  century  we  find  the  rifle  master  of  all  it 
surveyed  ;  machine  guns  were  being  still  used  experimentally, 
trajectories  were  slightly  more  curved  than  to-day,  indirect  laying 
was   only   exceptionally   employed  ;    but   of  all  the   changes   intro- 

*  Published  in  November,  1914,  in  the  Journal  of  the  Royal  United  Service 
Institution  under  the  title  "  The  Tactics  of  Penetration.  A  Counterblast  to 
German  Numerical  Superiority." 


so  The  Reformation  of  War 

duced  since  the  Russo-Japanese  war,  the  general  adoption  of  quick- 
firing  artillery  by  civilized  armies  is  out  and  out  the  greatest.  This 
gun,  if  correctly  employed,  will,  I  feel,  revolutionize  the  present 
theory  of  war  by  substituting  as  the  leading  grand  tactical  principle 
penetration  for  that  of  envelopment. 


"  To-day,  on  account  of  the  rapidity  of  fire  of  the  modern  field 
gun,  there  will  be  no  necessity  either  to  hold  back  guns  in  reserve, 
or  to  withdraw  them  from  their  positions,  for  all  that  will  be  neces- 
sary will  be  to  mass  ammunition  opposite  a  definite  point,  or  a  topo- 
graphically weak  point,  or  a  point  which  has  become  or  is  likely  to 
become  a  decisive  point,  so  that  the  guns  commanding  this  point, 
few  or  many  in  number,  may  pour  a  continuous  and  terrific  deluge 
of  shells  on  this  point,  and  so  enable  the  decisive  attack  to  proceed 
against  it.  Admitting  that  this  is  feasible,  then  the  problem  resolves 
itself  into  one  of  supplying  these  breaching  batteries  with  sufficient 
ammunition  ;  this  problem  should  not  be  a  difficult  one  to  solve 
now  that  motor  transport  is  in  general  use. 

"  If  I  am  right  in  this  deduction,  then  I  am  right  in  adding  :  that 
that  side  which  can  first  throw  its  adversary  on  the  defensive,  and, 
by  so  doing,  can  select  at  will  the  decisive  point  of  attack — or  which 
can,  through  a  careful  study  of  the  ground,  foresee  this  decisive 
point,  or  any  moderately  weak  point — has  all  to  gain  by  so  doing. 
The  defence  cannot  gauge,  or  will  have  the  greatest  difficulty  in 
gauging,  even  by  means  of  aerial  reconnaissance,  the  point  against 
which  the  decisive  attack  is  going  to  be  launched  if  the  assailants'  pre- 
paratory attack  be  violently  offensive.  All  it  can  do  is  to  attempt 
to  take  the  attack,  or  assault,  in  flank,  just  as  the  52nd 
Regiment  took  the  Old  Guard  of  Napoleon  in  flank  at  the  close  of 
the  Battle  of  Waterloo,  or  as  Colonel  Daubeney,  in  his  astonishing 
charge  at  Inkerman,  cut  the  great  Russian  trunk  column  in  two 
as  it  neared  the  Home  Ridge." 

I  then  examined  the  dangers  of  the  above  proposals  and 
suggested  the  use  of  the  machine  gun  in  order  to  lessen  them. 
I  wrote  : 

'  There  is  as  much  diffierence  between  machine-gun  and  infantry 
fire  to-day  as  there  was  between  light  infantry  and  heavy  infantry 
fire  a  hundred  years  ago.  So  great  is  this  difference  that  we  might 
almost  say  that  the  light  infantry  of  the  future  will  be  evolved  from 
the  machine  gunners  of  the  present.  That  is  that  the  assaulting 
column  of  the  future  will  be  flanked  by  these  terror-spreading 
weapons,  and  that  these  new  light  infantrymen,  like  the  old,  will  not 


The  Last  Lap  of  the  Physical  Epoch         81 

only  precede  the  assaulting  column  by  working  up  close  to  the  line 
of  the  holding  attack,  but  will  flank  it  on  both  sides,  producing  a 
somewhat  similar  effect  on  the  hostile  line  as  grape,  canister  and 
case  shot  did  during  the  first  fifty  years  of  the  last  century." 

I  concluded  this  memoir  by  saying  : 

"  I  have  no  doctrine  to  preach,  for  I  believe  in  none.  Every 
concrete  case  demands  its  own  particular  solution,  and  for  this 
solution  all  that  we  require  is  skill  and  knowledge,  skill  in  the  use 
of  our  weapons,  knowledge  of  our  enemy's  formations. 

"  A  physician  who  is  slave  to  a  doctrine,  as  was  the  famous  Doctor 
Sangrado  in  '  Gil  Bias,'  ends  by  killing  his  patients  ;  a  general 
who  is  under  the  spell  of  some  such  shibboleth  as  the  oblique- 
order,  envelopment,  penetration,  or  the  offensive  d  outrance,  ends 
by  destroying  his  army.  There  is  no  difference.  If  there  is  a 
doctrine  at  all,  then  it  is  common-sense,  that  is,  action  adapted  to 
circumstances. 

"I  do  not  lay  down  that  I  am  right  in  basing  my  proposed  de- 
ployment for  penetration  principally  on  the  power  of  quick-firing 
artillery ;  but  all  I  can  say  is  this  :  that  a  careful  study  of  past 
and  present  history  has  led  me  to  the  following  conclusions  : 

(i)  "  That  weapons  when  correctly  handled  seldom  fail  to  gain 
victory. 

(2)  "That  armies  are  more  often  ruined  by  dogmas  springing  from 
their  former  successes  than  by  the  skill  of  their  opponents.  .  .  ." 

The  criticism  on  this  memoir  was  :  "  Lacking  in  sound 
military  judgment." 

I  must  offer  the  reader  an  apology  for  the  introduction  of  so 
much  personal  matter,  and  I  must  ask  him  to  believe  me  when 
I  say  that  I  have  not  done  this  in  order  to  pat  my  prevision 
on  the  back,  but  to  show  that  it  is  possible  for  a  soldier,  possessing 
a  normal  standard  of  intelligence,  to  be  wise  before  the  event. 
So  frequently  have  I  been  told  how  easy  is  it  to  be  wise  after 
the  event  (which  is  surely  better  than  never  being  wise  at  all) , 
that  I  have  quoted  the  above  extracts  from  my  writings,  extracts 
containing  military  opinons  which,  though  imperfect,  were  not 
lacking  in  sound  military  judgment,  as  the  history  of  the  war 
testifies,  in  order  that  such  of  my  readers  who  are  not  altogether 
blinded  by  tradition  may  have  some  confidence  in  the  new 
ideas  contained  in  this  book.     I  do  not  ask  them  to  swallow 

6 


82  The  Reformation  of  War 

these  ideas  whole,  but  I  do  ask  them  not  to  proclaim  them 
indigestible  before  mentally  they  have  tasted  them.  I  will  now 
return  to  the  magical  year — 1866. 

From  the  battle  of  Sadowa  onwards,  tactical  envelopment 
became  a  shibboleth,  and  any  idea  of  defensive  warfare  a  heresy. 
Not  that  envelopment  in  itself  is  not  an  admirable  manoeuvre, 
but  that  its  effectiveness  depends  on  circumstances,  the  conditions 
of  the  moment  under  which  the  principles  of  war  have  to  be 
applied.  So  also  is  the  offensive  a  military  virtue,  but  this  in 
no  way  means  that  the  defensive  is  a  military  vice. 

In  August,  1914,  the  German  armies  were  drawn  up  in  phal- 
angial  formation  from  Aachen  to  Basle.  Their  right  was  to 
wheel  through  Belgium,  round  Paris,  and  then  advance  eastwards, 
sweeping  the  armies  of  France  into  Germany  and  Switzerland. 
This  plan  was  extraordinarily  simple  and  the  railways  appeared 
to  render  it  possible.  It  was  so  simple  that  the  German  General 
Staff  were  apparently  of  the  opinion,  as  their  system  of  promotion 
did  not  guarantee  their  possessing  a  skilled  leader  when  war 
broke  out,  that  genius  could  be  replaced  by  mechanical  move- 
ment ;  in  other  words,  that  the  goose  step  could  replace  intellect  ! 
The  unexpected  was  expunged ;  consequently,  a  reserve  to  meet 
it  was  unnecessary.  They  violated  the  principles  of  concentration 
and  economy  of  force,  and  sealed  their  fate  by  so  doing. 

The  French  General  Staff  must  have  realized  the  extreme 
likelihood  of  the  German  right  wing  marching  through  Belgium. 
Bearing  this  in  mind,  where  then  should  their  reserve  army  have 
been  ?  At  Paris,  because  Paris  is  the  biggest  railway  centre  in 
north-eastern  France.  Where  were  their  reserves  ?  Near  Ver- 
dun !  Even  if  the  Germans  had  restricted  their  front  of  attack  to 
the  line  Thionville-Basle,  the  best  position  of  the  French  reserves 
was  Paris  ;  even  if  they  had  proceeded  by  sea  and  disembarked 
their  armies  at  Cherbourg,  Brest  or  Bordeaux  ;  even  if  they  had 
landed  them  at  Toulon  or  marched  through  Italy  or  Switzerland, 
the  only  strategic  position  for  the  reserves  was  Paris  !  Why 
were  the  reserves  near  Verdun  ?  Because,  after  the  crushing 
defeats  sustained  by  the  French  armies  in  1870,  this  staff  had 


The  Last  Lap  of  the  Physical  Epoch         83 

turned  to  that  oracle  of  modern  warfare — Napoleon,  and  in  his 
wars  had  sought  an  answer  to  the  problem  of  future  victory. 
In  his  many  campaigns,  they  discovered  that  he  frequently 
made  use  of  a  lozenge  formation — an  advanced  guard,  two  strong 
wings  and  a  central  reserve.  Here  then  was  the  secret  of  success. 
So  they  drew  up  their  plan  accordingly,  forgetting  that,  in  the 
days  of  Napoleon,  railways  did  not  exist,  and  that,  consequently, 
his  reserves  were  so  placed  as  to  be  within  easy  marching  distance 
of  the  other  forces.  Had  the  French  General  Staff  done  what 
Napoleon,  in  the  strategical  circumstances  which  railways  had 
created,  could  scarcely  have  failed  to  do — concentrate  every 
available  man  at  Paris,  wait,  see  and  spring,  instead  of  the 
French  Armies  being  swept  into  Switzerland,  the  whole  of  the 
German  right  wing  would  have  been  annihilated  and,  quite 
possibly,  the  war  would  have  been  won  in  six  weeks. 

"It  is  the  man,  not  men  who  count  in  war,"  once  said 
Napoleon.  I  will  add  to  this  aphorism  :  such  a  man  does  not 
turn  his  brain  into  a  museum  for  past  battles — for  the  only  war 
for  him  is  the  next  war  ! 

Once  the  first  great  operation  of  the  war — the  German  en- 
velopment of  the  French  armies,  had  been  frustrated  by  the 
counter-attack  of  the  Allies  during  the  latter  stages  of  that 
series  of  battles  known  as  the  battle  of  the  Marne,  equilibrium 
was  established  on  the  slopes  of  the  river  Aisne.  This  condition 
was  followed  by  a  race  to  the  coast  and  culminated  in  the  defeat 
of  the  Germans  at  the  first  battle  of  Ypres,  at  which  battle  tradi- 
tional warfare  on  the  Western  Front  terminated.  Henceforth 
for  several  years  the  war  on  this  front  was  destined  to  become  a 
war  of  entrenchments,  a  siege,  and  the  main  weapon  in  the 
armoury  of  the  besieger  is  famine. 

Meanwhile,  at  sea  another  war  was  in  progress,  a  war  but 
distantly  connected  with  the  land  operations  except  for  one 
incident  which  in  fact  constituted  the  most  astonishing  naval 
operation  of  the  war. 

On  August  4,  1914,  two  German  warships,  the  Goeben  and 
Breslau,  were  busily  engaged  in  taking  in  supplies  at  Messina 

6* 


84  The  Reformation  of  War 

They  could  not  escape  through  the  Straits  of  Gibraltar  nor  through 
the  Suez  Canal.  They  could  either  seek  refuge  in  Pola  or  in  the 
Sea  of  Marmora.  Of  these  two  lines  of  retreat,  the  first  was 
objectless,  the  second  full  of  possibilities  ;  consequently,  Admiral 
Souchon  adopted  the  second  line  and  sailed  for  the  Dardanelles, 
through  which  he  steamed  on  August  10.  In  England  this 
astute  move  was  derided,  because  the  greatest  naval  power  in 
the  world  could  only  think  traditionally  of  naval  warfare.  Ships 
as  fighting  machines  were  understood,  but  as  political  instruments 
— no'  such  use  was  beyond  the  traditional  ken.  Out  of  the  Goeben 
sprouted  the  Gallipoli  campaign,  and  out  of  its  failure  the  Middle 
East  Problem.  What  a  move  :  for  the  West,  the  most  decisive 
since  Trafalgar. 

While,  prior  to  the  war,  in  the  great  armies  of  the  world,  we 
find  man-power  obliterating  tactics,  so  in  the  great  navies  do 
we  find  machine-power  doing  exactly  the  same  thing.  Men  and 
more  men,  battleships  and  more  battleships,  but  how  these  men 
or  battleships  should  fight  or  be  fought,  and  what  influence 
the  inventions  of  the  last  forty  years  would  have  on  tactics 
was  not  even  imagined.  On  land,  soldiers  were  expected  to 
fight  much  as  they  fought  in  1870,  and  at  sea  sailors  would  fight 
much  as  they  fought  in  1805.  Such  was  the  position  in  19 14. 
Well  might  Admiral  Mahan  write  : 

"  The  student  will  observe  that  changes  in  tactics  have  not  only 
taken  place  after  changes  in  weapons,  which  necessarily  is  the  case, 
but  that  the  interval  between  such  changes  has  been  unduly  long. 
This  doubtless  arises  from  the  fact  that  an  improvement  of  weapons 
is  due  to  the  energy  of  one  or  two  men,  while  changes  in  tactics 
have  to  overcome  the  inertia  of  a  conservative  class  ;  but  it  is  a 
great  evil.  It  can  be  remedied  only  by  a  candid  recognition  of  each 
change." 

So  conservative  had  the  naval  mind  become  that,  in  1914, 
it  had  not  fully  realized  the  greatest  of  all  modern  influences 
on  sea  fighting — the  replacement  of  wind  by  steam  as  a  means 
of  fleet  propulsion.  The  doctrine  of  fleet  tactics,  as  held  in  July, 
1914,  was  in  brief :    "  parallel  actions  with  a  hope  of  envelop- 


The  Last  Lap  of  the  Physical  Epoch         85 

ment."  These  actions  to  be  fought  at  what  to-day  would  appear 
to  be  ridiculously  short  ranges. 

The  moral  influence  of  the  unknown  factors  of  modern  naval 
warfare — the  realization  of  the  conditions  under  which  the 
objective  had  to  be  gained  ;  the  power  of  weapons  the  nature 
of  which  was  not  fully  understood,  and  lack  of  knowledge  in 
tactics,  consequent  on  this  ignorance,  were  due  not  so  much  to 
inefficiency  as  to  the  fact  that  mechanical  progress  had  outstepped 
tactical  thought  and  training.  Time,  in  fact,  had  been  insufficient 
wherein  to  digest  science,  and  the  result  was  that,  while  the 
grand  tactical  purpose  of  the  opposing  fleets  had  been  based 
on  decisive  action  during  peace  time,  directly  war  was  declared 
the  unknown  quantities,  the  resultants  of  science,  materialized, 
and  the  war  at  sea,  like  the  war  on  land,  assumed  a  deadlock, 
attrition  replacing  the  offensive  as  the  grand  tactics  of  the  opposing 
sides. 

Thus  we  see  that,  when  we  examine  the  opening  phases  of 
the  Great  War,  traditionally  educated  and  trained  armies  and 
navies  have  but  one  chance  of  success,  that  is  the  initial  operation 
they  undertake.  Success  being  based  on  the  fact  that  as  their 
opponents  may  also  be  tradition-bound,  their  own  tradition 
may  triumph  over  that  of  their  adversaries.  Also  we  see  that, 
if  the  initial  clash  of  arms  does  not  result  in  victory,  at  once 
the  influence  of  weapons,  means  of  movement  and  protection, 
which  have  been  designed  since  these  traditions  became  stabilized 
in  blind  custom  and  routine,  exert  their  sway  and  bring  traditional 
warfare  to  an  end,  and  out  of  the  knowledge  gained  from  these 
weapons  slowly  evolves  a  new  doctrine  which  replaces  the  old 
dogma. 

Throughout  the  Great  War,  we  watch  this  struggle  between 
the  new  and  the  old.  The  old  cannot  imagine  that  its  dogma 
is  wrong  :  was  not  it  successful  in  1870,  and  has  not  it  been 
laid  down  in  every  manual  and  text  book  since  ?  The  new 
scoffs  and  exaggerates ;  it  is  carried  away  by  its  own  novelty, 
which  gains  an  unnatural  brilliance  by  being  contrasted  with 
the   opaque   substance   of   dead   thought.     Wrhen   we   examine 


86  The  Reformation  of  War 

the  military  history  of  the  late  Middle  Ages,  it  astonishes  us  to 
watch  the  Chivalry  of  France  being,  for  the  space  of  a  century, 
mown  down  by  arrows  and  still  not  grasping  the  tactical  value 
of  the  bow.  In  years  to  come,  some  future  historian  may  possibly 
contrast,  with  this  suicidal  adherence  to  custom,  the  fact  that, 
though  in  1904  the  machine  gun  had  proved  itself  to  be  the  most 
deadly  of  small-arm  weapons,  ten  years  later  the  great  armies  of 
Europe  had  to  learn  this  lesson  again.  In  fact  it  would  appear 
that  both  soldier  and  sailor  possess  no  power  of  absorbing  tactical 
knowledge  except  through  personal  experience.  In  1899  a 
British  Division  was  equipped  with  twenty-four  machine  guns  ;  in 
1914  it  was  still  equipped  with  twenty-four  :  yet,  in  1918,  fearful 
cost  in  life  had  compelled  the  number  of  automatic  weapons  to  be 
increased  to  over  rive  hundred.  Accepting  this  number  as 
necessary,  why  was  the  1914  equipment  the  same  as  that  of 
1899  ?  The  answer  is,  it  had  become  a  tradition  that  the  number 
of  machine  guns  in  a  battalion  should  be  two  ;  just  as  in  the 
fourteenth  century  it  was  a  tradition  that  no  gentleman  could 
fight  save  on  horseback. 

The  objective  in  war  may,  as  the  text  books  declare,  be  the 
imposition  of  the  will  of  one  army  on  the  other,  yet  history 
shows  that  the  purpose  of  an  army  or  navy  has,  in  peace  time, 
little  to  do  with  war,  its  object  being  not  freely  to  evolve  but 
in  place  to  maintain  its  traditions.  Some  are  vital  to  its  existence, 
others  full  of  the  germs  of  decay.  Both  are,  however,  holy, 
and  to  attack  either  is  military  blasphemy.  I  will  now  turn 
to  the  next  period  of  the  Great  War  —  the  attack  by 
materiel. 

After  a  few  weeks  of  real  warfare,  the  offensive  d  outrance, 
that  high  gospel  of  the  pre-war  manuals,  was  reduced  to  a  wallow- 
ing defensive  among  mud  holes  and  barbed  wire.  Armies, 
through  their  own  lack  of  foresight,  were  reduced  to  the  posi- 
tion of  human  cattle.  They  browsed  behind  their  fences,  and  on 
occasion  snorted  and  bellowed  at  each  other.  The  one  problem 
which  now  confronted  them  was  :  how  to  re-establish  movement, 
for  until  one  or  both  sides  could  move  there  was  no  possibility 


The  Last  Lap  of  the  Physical  Epoch         87 

of  a  decision  by  arms,  and  famine  alone  must  become  the  arbiter 
of  peace.  Some  there  were  who  actually  recommended  this 
course,  but  their  voices  were  drowned  by  shouts  for  shells.  Shells 
were  to  be  the  panacea  of  all  difficulties,  more  shells  and  still 
more  shells,  and  then  by  steel  a  road  could  be  blasted  to  Paris 
or  Berlin.  A  veritable  blood  and  iron  lust  swept  over  the  armies 
of  Europe. 

As  the  entire  arsenals  of  the  civilized  world  could  not  possibly 
meet  the  demand,  the  General  Staffs  turned  to  the  industries 
of  their  respective  nations,  and  a  new  battle  was  begun.  Which 
nation  would  produce  the  largest  output  ?  For  on  this  output, 
so  it  was  thought,  would  victory  depend.  Of  all  great  industrial 
countries,  Great  Britain  was  the  least  well  prepared  for  this 
engagement,  because  the  true  meaning  of  the  quick-firing  gun 
had  not  been  grasped.  Nevertheless,  the  astonishing  ability 
for  improvisation  possessed  by  Englishmen  enabled  them 
so  well  to  cope  with  the  supply,  that  the  General  Staff  literally 
became  intoxicated  on  T.N.T.  We  now  lose  sight  of  strategy 
and  tactics  in  a  storm  of  shells  and  roaring  high  explosives  ; 
our  very  tympanums  are  rent  ! 

For  the  preliminary  bombardments  of  the  battle  of  Hooge, 
we  fired  18,000  shells  ;  for  those  at  the  battle  of  the  Somme, 
2,000,000  shells,  for  those  at  Arras,  in  1917,  2,000,000  shells, 
and  for  those  at  Ypres  the  same  year,  4,300,000  shells.  At  the 
last-mentioned  battle  the  tonnage  of  shells  fired  during  the  pre- 
liminary bombardments  alone  amounted  to  107,000  tons,  the  cost 
of  which  has  been  estimated  at  £22,000,000,  a  figure  very  nearly 
equal  to  the  total  yearly  cost  of  the  pre-war  British  Home  Army. 
If  this  enormous  expenditure  had  resulted  in  victory,  to  the 
traditional  soldier  it  would  have  been  cheap  at  the  price.  But 
it  did  not  result  in  victory,  and  it  could  not  result  in  victory, 
and  for  the  following  very  simple  reason.  In  the  process  of  digging 
up  trenches  by  means  of  shell  fire,  everything  in  the  neighbour- 
hood of  the  trenches  was  dug  up.  Roads  vanished,  tracks 
vanished,  railways  vanished  and  the  surface  of  the  ground 
vanished  under  the  influence  of  the  material  earthquake  to  which 


88  The  Reformation  of  War 

all  things  were  subjected.  The  enemy  was  killed,  his  wire 
entanglements  were  cut  to  pieces  and  his  trenches  were  blown 
in.  Yet  in  these  very  acts  of  destruction  was  an  impassable 
crater  area  formed,  and,  when  surface  water  abounded,  as  at 
Ypres,  or  when  rain  fell  in  torrents,  as  at  Beaumont  Hamel,  none 
save  water-fowl  could  have  crossed  the  morass  of  mud,  and  then 
these  birds  would  have  done  better  to  fly.  In  place  of  accelerating 
infantry  movement,  every  shell  that  fell  impeded  this  all  necessary 
act  of  winning  the  war  by  force  of  arms. 

There  was  another  reason,  and  a  more  visible  one  still,  why 
this  monstrous  attack  by  shells  was  doomed  to  failure  when 
directed  against  a  well-organized  antagonist,  namely,  that 
bombardments  lasting  from  seven  to  twenty-one  days  in  duration 
rendered  any  form  of  surprise  impossible.  When  a  big  game 
hunter  visits  East  Africa  to  shoot  lions,  he  does  not  equip  himself 
with  a  bassoon,  and  then,  when  a  lion  is  met  with,  walk  round 
the  beast  for  a  fortnight  playing  on  this  instrument.  He  does 
not  thus  comport  himself,  since  all  idea  of  surprise  would  vanish, 
and  so  also  would  the  lion.  Unfortunately,  a  staunch  and  de- 
termined enemy  does  not  behave  like  a  wild  animal,  in  place 
of  bolting  from  the  bassoon,  he  assembles  his  forces  opposite 
the  spot  which  is  being,  like  Jericho,  trumpeted  to  earth,  and, 
when  the  attack  is  well  bogged  in  the  slough  created  by  gun-fire, 
attacks  in  his  turn.  That  our  great  artillery  battles  killed  thou- 
sands of  Germans  is  undoubted,  they  could  not  help  doing  so, 
but  equally  is  it  certain  that  they  resulted  in  terrific  casualties 
to  ourselves.  The  battles  on  the  Somme,  in  1916,  and  at  Ypres, 
in  1917,  cost  the  British  Army  in  killed,  wounded  and  missing, 
over  800,000  casualties,  and  as  we  were  the  attackers,  the  pro- 
babilities are  that  our  casualties  were  considerably  heavier  than 
those  of  the  Germans.  Also  is  it  asserted  that  these  battles  were 
of  assistance  in  beating  the  enemy,  that  they  used  up  the  enemy's 
fighting  forces  and  accelerated  demoralization  :  but  it  may  well 
be  asked — at  what  price  ? 

In  my  own  opinion,  the  monopoly  of  strategy  and  tactics  by 
shell  bludgeoning  prolonged  the  war  in  place  of  shortening  it.     It 


The  Last  Lap  of  the  Physical  Epoch         89 

dulled  the  imagination  of  the  higher  command,  who  became 
obsessed  by  two  ideas  :  fill  the  trenches  to  hold  them,  and  blow 
them  to  pieces  to  capture  them.  Consequently,  we  see  during 
this  period,  which  was  a  long  one,  the  art  of  war  slipping  back 
to  the  position  it  held  in  the  days  of  the  Macedonian  phalanx. 
As  the  brain  power  of  the  opposing  armies  grew  smaller,  for  all 
General  Staffs  fell  victims  to  the  shell-plague,  the  bodies  of  these 
same  armies  grew  bigger  and  bigger,  until  the  administrative 
organization  for  the  supply  of  materiel  alone  absorbed  such  vast 
numbers  of  men  that,  through  shortage  of  man-power,  the 
fighting  troops  were  nearly  strangled  by  those  whose  duty  it 
was  to  administer  to  their  needs — armies  had  now  become 
pot-bellied  and  pea-brained. 

The  completeness  of  the  deadlock,  the  seemingly  impossible 
task  of  re-establishing  movement  in  the  decisive  theatre  of  the 
war,  resulted,  in  a  marked  extent,  in  a  monopolization  of  the 
war  plan  by  amateur  political  strategists.  The  war  had  either 
to  be  won,  lost,  or  drawn  ;  consequently,  as  the  problem  on  the 
Western  Front  was  considered  unsolvable,  some  other  front  had 
to  be  discovered.  Already,  early  in  1915,  the  Germans  had 
changed  their  main  objective.  Their  intention  was  no  longer 
to  destroy  the  French  armies  but  the  Russian,  because  of  all 
the  armies  contending  the  Russian  army  was  in  tactics  the  least 
developed,  for  their  traditionalism  was  very  old  and  very  obsolete, 
and  more  hidebound  than  that  of  France.  The  giant  said  : 
I  have  15,000,000  men  classified  for  mobilization  ;  I  have  as 
many  infantry  divisions  as  France  and  Germany  put  together, 
and  of  cavalry  beyond  number.  I  will  "  make  up  for  deficiencies 
in  technique  by  lavish  expenditure  of  blood  ;  "  and  before  the  war 
was  a  year  old  the  Russian  casualties  totalled  just  under 
4,000,000  !  In  1917,  Brusilov's  armies  lost  no  less  than  375,000 
men  in  twenty-seven  days,  and  about  1,000,000  in  four  months. 
All  we  can  do  is  to  gasp  at  this  madness.  If  war,  as  it  is  so  often 
asserted,  is  a  continuation  of  peace  policy,  then  war  is  also  a  link 
with  the  policy  which  will  follow  victory.  During  peace,  man's 
policy  is  to  live  and  not  to  die  ;  consequently,    if  war  be  a 


90  The  Reformation  of  War 

continuation  of  this  policy,  then  soldiers  should  not  be  sacri- 
ficed like  rabbits  in  an  Australian  catch. 

"  The  Russians,"  writes  General  Knox,  "  were  just  big- 
hearted  children  who  had  thought  out  nothing,  and  had  stumbled 
half -asleep  into  a  wasps'  nest."  In  nature  they  were  generous, 
always  willing  to  sacrifice  themselves  for  their  allies,  in  character 
corrupt,  and  in  disposition  childlike.  The  leadership  of  their 
generals  was  beneath  contempt.  Just  before  Tannenberg, 
General  Samsonov  sent  back  for  his  sword,  remarking  "  that  he 
was  now  in  an  enemy's  country,  and  must  go  armed."  His 
"  all  prevailing  idea  was  to  try  and  see  the  battle  with  his  own 
eyes,"  a  la  Cossack.  Rennenkampf  was  just  as  bad  ;  on  one 
occasion  when  the  Germans  withdrew,  he  said  to  another  officer  : 
"  You  can  take  off  your  clothes  now  ;  the  Germans  are  retiring," 
quite  failing  to  see  that  it  was  the  very  moment  to  attack  and  not 
to  go  to  bed.  Cavalry  charged  trenches  ;  the  Guards  refused 
to  promote  ensigns  from  the  ranks,  "  as  men  so  promoted  might 
remain  with  them  after  the  war  !  '  A  minister  was  entitled  to 
draw  horse  hire  per  verst  for  twenty-four  horses  when,  by  rail, 
he  visited  Vladivostock  !  And  when  General  Gulevich  received 
a  telegram  appointing  him  to  an  active  command,  as  he  at  first 
thought,  he  was  much  upset,  for  it  was  his  custom  to  rest  in  bed 
between  two  and  five  p.m.  daily.  But  when  he  discovered  that 
the  appointment  was  only  that  of  Chief  of  the  Staff  of  the  North- 
West  Front  he  was  greatly  relieved,  and  at  once  gave  orders  for 
a  thanksgiving  service  to  be  held.  "  Few  officers  attended  this 
service,  for  they  had  all  rushed  off  to  scribble  memoranda  for  the 
General's  guidance  of  the  honours  and  rewards  they  wished  to 
receive."* 

I  have  made  this  digression  into  the  internal  state  of  Russian 
military  traditionalism  not  only  to  show  to  what  a  parlous 
state  of  inefficiency  stagnation  may  bring  an  army,  but  because 
it  had  a  pronounced  influence  on  the  economic  phase  of  the  war. 
Not  only  did  the  deficiencies  of  the  Russian  army  demand  an 

*  "  With    the    Russian     Armies,     1914-1917,"     Major-General     Sir    Alfred 
Knox,  K.C.B.,  C.M.G. 


The  Last  Lap  of  the  Physical  Epoch         91 

enormous  provision  of  munitions,  but  they  dragged  the  war 
eastwards.  For  the  Germans  this  change  of  front  was  com- 
paratively easy  ;  for  us  and  the  French  it  would  have  been  im- 
possible had  we  not  possessed  command  of  the  sea.  Thus  we 
watch  the  military  weakness  of  Russia  acting  as  an  incentive  to 
the  Germans  to  close  down  their  operations  on  the  Western 
Front,  and,  by  means  of  their  magnificent  railway  system,  to 
reopen  operations  in  Poland.  In  order  to  follow  suit,  the  Allies, 
though  knowing  full  well  that  the  German  forces  in  the  West 
were  inferior  to  their  own,  followed  up  this  move  with  an  attempt 
to  capture  Constantinople,  so  that,  by  gaining  command  of 
the  Black  Sea,  the  Russian  armies  might  be  supplied.  In  truth 
Russian  strength  did  not  lie  in  supplies,  but,  as  in  1813,  in  re- 
tirement. Thus  we  see  that  though  these  supplies  may  have 
added  to  the  moral  of  the  Russian  troops,  by  persuading  them 
not  to  retire  except  through  force  of  arms,  they  prolonged 
the  war.  What,  I  am  of  opinion,  the  Russians  should  have  done 
was  what  the  Germans  did  on  part  of  the  Western  Front  in 
February,  1917,  that  is  retire  to  a  Hindenburg  line  (not  necessarily 
trenches),  not  a  line  twenty  miles  in  rear,  but  two  hundred,  three 
hundred,  or  possibly  four  hundred. 

In  the  Gallipoli  campaign,  the  abuse  of  materiel  was  the  main 
cause  of  its  failure.  "  In  1906  the  possibilities  of  such  an  attack 
had  been  examined  by  the  British  General  Staff,  and  the  opinion 
arrived  at  was  that  an  unaided  action  by  the  fleet  was  to  be 
deprecated  ;  and  if  combined  operations  were  to  be  undertaken, 
no  landing  could  be  effected  on  the  Gallipoli  Peninsula  unless 
the  co-operating  naval  squadron  could  guarantee  with  its  guns 
that  the  landing  force  should  reach  the  shore  unmolested  and  find 
after  disembarkation  a  sufficiently  extended  area,  free  from 
hostile  fire,  to  enable  it  to  form  up  for  battle  on  suitable 
ground.  In  summing  up,  the  General  Staff  stated  that  they  did 
not  consider  that  the  co-operating  fleet  would  be  able  to  give 
this  guarantee,  and  they  recommended  such  an  operation  should 
not  be  attempted."* 

*  "  Soldiers  of  the  Prophet,"  Lieut.-Colonel  C.  C.  R.  Murphy,  p.  121. 


92  The  Reformation  of  War 

Though  there  was  only  one  possible  hope  of  such  an  attack 
succeeding,  namely,  that  its  initiation  should  come  as  a  complete 
surprise,  as  early  as  November  3,  1914,  the  British  Navy,  by 
shelling  the  forts  at  the  entrance  of  the  Dardanelles,  first  drew 
the  attention  of  the  Turkish  General  Staff  to  a  theatre  of  opera- 
tions which  offered  decisive  results.  On  March  5,  1915,  a 
further  bombardment  took  place,  and  on  April  25,  the  first 
landing  was  attempted. 

In  these  operations  the  mistake  made  by  the  navy  was  identi- 
cal with  the  mistake  which  governed  the  operations  of  the  army 
during  this  period  in  the  evolution  of  the  war.  Surprise — the 
moral  attack,  was  replaced  by  bombardment — the  materiel 
attack  ;  cunning  was  ousted  by  steel,  and  the  attack  once  again 
failed. 

When  considering  the  phases  into  which  I  have  divided  the 
war,  it  must  not  be  supposed  that  any  hard  or  fast  dividing  line 
can  be  drawn  between  them.  To  me  they  are  comparable  to  a 
geological  chart.  The  periods — tertiaty,  quaternary,  etc.,  are 
shown  by  well  defined  bands  of  colour  containing  within  each 
drawings  of  the  types  of  animals,  plants  and  minerals  more 
especially  belonging  to  each  epoch.  In  fact  there  are  no  dividing 
lines,  no  fixed  beginnings  or  endings,  only  a  slow  steady  pro- 
gression. Similarly  with  the  phases  of  the  Great  War,  which  I 
am  now  examining  :  one  period  emerges  from  another,  takes  form, 
and  then  falls  under  the  spell  of  some  virile  idea  which  the  tests 
and  trials  of  the  war  have  proved  sound.  W7e  see  this  clearly  in 
the  increasing  employment  of  the  most  powerful  of  the  older 
weapons — quick-firing  guns  and  machine  guns  ;  then  of  the  newer 
weapons — aeroplanes  and  submarines,  and  lastly  of  altogether 
new  weapons — gas  and  tanks. 

As  traditional  warfare  merges  into  the  war  of  materiel,  every 
possible  effort  is  made  to  enhance  gun-power  by  air-power,  in  the 
form  of  fire-control  and  direction  from  the  air,  and  yet,  as  I  will 
show  later  on,  this  was  not  the  main  duty  of  the  aeroplane.  So 
also  with  the  submarine  ;  at  first  she  was  considered  as  a  minor 
adjunct  of  a  fleet ;   nevertheless,  as  the  war  proved,  her  main 


The  Last  Lap  of  the  Physical  Epoch         93 

power  lay  in  her  ability  to  dispense  with  fleet  protection  and  to 
become  the  sniper  of  the  seas. 

As  traditional  warfare  could  find  no  solution  to  the  problem 
of  re-establishing  mobility  once  battle  fronts  had  become  en- 
trenched, and  as  soldiers,  for  the  most  part,  could  only  think  of 
war  in  traditional  terms,  the  solution  to  this  problem  had,  in  the 
main,  to  be  sought  outside  normal  military  thought,  and  the  only 
place  to  seek  it  was  among  the  civil  sciences.     Being  a  great 
chemical  country,  Germany  turned  to  gas,  and  being  a  great  en- 
gineering country,  we,  in  Great  Britain,  turned  to  the  petrol  engine 
and  produced  the  tank.     The  actual  date  when  these  two  new 
means  of  war  were  first  thought  of  does  not  much  matter,  for  the 
ideas  underlying  them  are  very  old,  but  a  study  of  modern  war- 
fare in  general  and  of  modern  industry  in  particular  would  have 
given  the  General  Staffs  of  Europe  a  clearer  idea  of  the  probable 
nature  of  the  next  war  than  the  one  held  by  them  in  1914.     Un- 
shackled by  the  traditional  aspect  of  warfare,  it  was  for  this 
reason   that  Mr.    Bloch,  a  pacifist,    was   able   to   visualize   the 
nature  of  the   next  war  more   clearly   than  the  most   eminent 
of    General    Staff    Officers.      If  it   had  only  been  appreciated 
that,  failing  an  overwhelming  initial  success,  such  as  a  second 
Sadowa  or  Sedan,   the  next  war  would  be  a  war  of  trenches, 
then  it   would  have  logically   followed    that   not   only   would 
enormous     quantities    of    ammunition     be    required,    but    to 
maintain  mobility  under  the  tornado  resulting,   armour  would 
have  to  be  reintroduced. 

The  last  of  the  great  siege  wars  was  the  war  in  the  Crimea, 
and  though  this  war  had  been  studied  by  soldiers  it  had  been  little 
understood.  Had  it  been  carefully  examined,  it  would  have  been 
realized  that  the  conditions  of  19 15  were  very  similar  to  those  of 
1854,  and  that  the  difficulties  of  1915  could  be  overcome  by  the 
solutions  suggested  to  meet  those  which  confronted  the  British 
Army  in  1854. 

In  1854,  we  And  Mr.  James  Cowen,  a  philanthropist,  sug- 
gesting to  the  British  Government  the  adoption  of  a  "  locomotive 
land  battery  fitted  with  scythes  to  mow  down  infantry  "  :    in 


94  The  Reformation  of  War 

other  words  the  tank.  The  same  year,  Lord  Dundonald,  a  noted 
admiral,  suggested  that  gas  could  be  usefully  employed  in  order 
to  asphyxiate  the  garrison  of  Sebastopol.  Neither  of  these  sug- 
gestions was  adopted,  because  they  did  not  harmonize  with  the 
traditional  methods  of  waging  war.  They  were  considered  too 
terrible  to  be  contemplated.  Curious  to  relate,  however,  the 
government  which  showed  such  qualms  as  regards  killing  the 
enemy  showed  none  as  regards  inflicting  a  miserable  death  on 
thousands  of  our  own  men  through  their  gross  neglect  of  ad- 
ministrative arrangements  and  hospital  necessities.  The  reason 
for  this  was  that  death  by  typhus,  dysentery  and  neglected  wounds 
did  not  violate  tradition,  while  death  by  gassing  or  mowing  down 
would  have.  In  the  Crimean  war,  tradition  won  through,  and  at 
what  suffering  and  cost  ! 

In  the  Great  War,  tradition  once  again  formed  phalanx 
against  all  innovation  and  improvement ;  luckily  for  us,  it  went 
down  before  the  hammer-blows  of  science,  but  unfortunately, 
though  expectedly,  immediately  the  Armistice  had  been  signed, 
tradition  rose  like  a  phoenix  from  its  ashes. 

For  a  generation  to  come,  tradition  will  fight  against  the  new 
doctrines  of  warfare.  These  will  ultimately  win  through,  as  they 
must,  and,  in  the  internecine  struggle  between  1914  and  1918 
organizations,  will  once  again  the  next  war  be  forgotten.  Our 
only  chance  to  escape  this  calamity  is  to  change  our  outlook  on 
history  ;  in  place  of  solidifying  reason,  history  should  liquefy  the 
imagination.  History  never  actually  repeats  itself,  for  it  con- 
stitutes one  continuous  transformation.  Its  tendencies  may  be 
ascertained  by  study,  but  foresight  into  these  demands  more  than 
study :  it  demands  meditation  and  a  continuous  use  of  the  word 
"  why  ?  " 

I  will  now  examine  the  next  great  period,  that  of  the  economic 
attack. 

The  enormous  demands  made  for  all  types  of  munitions  of  war 
and  warlike  supplies  during  the  phase  of  the  materiel  attack, 
brought  into  a  clear  light  those  economic  foundations  of  the  war 
which,  in  peace  time,  had  lain  too  deep  to  be  noticed  much  by 


The  Last  Lap  of  the  Physical  Epoch         95 

soldiers.  First,  these  munitions  had  to  be  supplied ;  secondly, 
their  supply  curtailed  the  manufacture  of  luxuries  as  well  as  many 
everyday  necessities.  So  visible  did  these  economic  foundations 
become,  that  it  was  not  long  before  the  General  Staffs  of  the  con- 
tending nations  realized  that,  if  the  food  supply  of  the  enemy 
could  be  cut  off,  the  will  of  the  hostile  civil  population  would  be 
undermined,  and  with  this  loss  of  will  to  endure,  their  military 
forces  would  be  rendered  useless. 

The  first  military  problem  of  the  Allies  now  became  that  of  the 
circumvallation  of  the  Central  Powers ;  their  second  problem, 
their  surrender  by  starvation.  Consequently,  during  the  th'rd 
phase  of  the  war,  the  problem  of  re-establishing  tactical  mobility 
was  to  a  certain  extent  replaced  by  a  direct  attack  on  the  enemy's 
stomach.  The  nature  of  this  type  of  war  is  simple,  yet,  through- 
out history,  it  has  been  persistently  misunderstood. 

Starvation  is  a  means  towards  an  end  and  not  the  end  itself, 
and  I  will  repeat  it  again  :  the  end,  objective  or  goal  in  warfare  is 
the  imposition  of  the  policy  of  one  hostile  government  on  another, 
the  foundations  of  these  respective  policies  being  the  wills  of  the 
contending  nations.  These  wills  must,  however,  be  attacked  in 
such  a  manner  that  their  possessors  are  not  permanently  injured  ; 
for  to  weaken  the  enemy,  either  permanently  or  for  a  long  period 
after  the  cessation  of  hostilities,  is,  as  I  have  already  pointed  out, 
tantamount  to  wounding  one's  own  body  by  a  self-inflicted  blow. 
Such  a  blow  is  immoral,  not  because  it  compels  an  enemy  to 
accept  a  policy  which  is  distasteful  to  him,  but  because,  by  re- 
ducing the  physique  of  the  enemy  and  especially  of  the  enemy's 
children,  it  ultimately  not  only  reduces  his  prosperity  but  the 
prosperity  of  the  world — it  is  in  fact  a  blow  directed  against 
civilization. 

The  encirclement  of  the  Central  Powers  by  the  Allies  resulted 
in  the  most  gigantic  siege  in  history,  the  lines  of  circumvallation 
running  from  Calais  to  Kermanshah,  and  thence  through  Russia 
to  the  Baltic.  The  establishment  of  this  immense  circle  of 
bayonets  took  time,  but  what  took  longer  still  was  the  time  taken 
by  the  British  Government  to  realize  that,  once  this  siege  had 


96  The  Reformation  of  War 

been  determined  on,  the  lines  of  circumvallation  were  useless  as 
long  as  supplies  could  be  shipped  in  vast  quantities  to  neutral 
countries  and  thence  transported  to  Germany.  The  problem  of 
starvation  was  virtually  a  politico-naval  one,  and  the  politician 
was  afraid  of  enforcing  it,  not  because  it  was  immoral,  but  be- 
cause it  might  prove  detrimental  to  the  pockets  of  neutrals  who, 
like  vampires,  were  feasting  on  the  blood  of  the  battlefields. 
Such  neutrality  as  this  is  beneath  contempt,  and  during  the 
war  its  immorality  was  only  exceeded  by  the  vice  of  political 
fear. 

The  bottling  up  of  the  German  fleet  immediately  after  the 
declaration  of  war  drew  the  attention  of  the  German  Government 
to  the  necessity  of  economy  in  resources,  especially  of  all  food 
stocks.  In  December,  1914,  Professor  Eltzbacher  produced  a  book 
on  this  subject  entitled  :  "  Die  deutsche  Volksernahrung  und  der 
englische  Aushungerungsplan,"*  which  dealt  with  this  question 
in  minute  detail  down  to  the  tonnage  of  dog's  flesh.  Outside 
scientific  circles,  however,  little  attention  was  paid  to  this  question 
in  England,  as  may  be  gathered  from  Professor  Poulton's 
"  Romanes  Lecture  "  for  1915.     In  this  lecture  he  says  : 

"  Lord  Robert  Robert  Cecil  is  reported  in  The  Times  of  December 
3rd  (1915)  to  have  said,  '  Our  policy  was  to  secure  our  rights  and  to 
starve  Germany  first  of  all.  Starving  Germany  was,  of  course, 
only  a  metaphorical  expression — it  was  impossible ;  he  would 
rather  say  deprive  her  of  essential  articles.'  What  right  had  Lord 
Robert  to  say  that  the  starving  of  Germany  was  impossible  ?  He 
is  not  an  expert  on  food  supply,  and  he  quoted  no  authority.  Has 
he  studied  the  Eltzbacher  memoirs  and  Dr.  Waller's  and  Professor 
Ashley's  criticisms  ?  Has  he  asked  for  a  report  from  the  Royal 
Society's  Committee  on  the  food  supply  of  Germany  ?  What  we 
really  need  to  end  this  war  is  knowledge  and  firm  action  based  on  it. 
As  it  is,  with  the  slipshod  ways  of  conducting  war  and  neglect  of 
scientific  authority,  our  own  Government  has  done  very  much  to 
help  Germany  out  of  the  difficulty.  It  has  ignored,  as  Dr.  Waller 
says  in  the  introduction  to  the  English  translation,  '  the  obvious 
fact  that  the  food  of  a  besieged  nation,  as  of  a  besieged  fortress,  in 

*  English  edition   1915,   "  Germany's  Food  and  England's  Plan  to  starve 
Her  out." 


The  Last  Lap  of  the  Physical  Epoch         97 

tons  of  bread,  meat  and  potatoes  is  as  truly  its  ammunition  as  are 
its  shells.'  "* 

From  the  above  we  see  that  while  the  War  Office  and  the  Ad- 
miralty were  exerting  all  their  strength  to  encircle  and  so  be- 
siege the  Central  Powers,  the  Board  of  Trade  was  forcibly  feeding 
these  Powers  through  the  Dutch  spout.  Neutral  countries  may 
possess  certain  rights  during  war  time,  but  to  allow  them  to 
supply  the  enemy  with  food  when  he  is  being  besieged  is  to  turn 
even  traditional  warfare  upside-down. 

When,  however,  the  blockade  began  to  tighten,  Germany  had 
no  intention  of  committing  felo-de-se  in  order  to  maintain  a  naval 
custom  or  a  humanitarian  tradition.  She  was  now  fighting  for 
her  life,  and  not  being  able  to  hit  above  the  belt  she  hit  below  it 
in  order  to  make  good  by  cunning  her  physical  naval  deficit^ 
She  was,  consequently,  outlawed.  Though  the  infringement  of 
international  rules  and  customs  is  always  dangerous,  as  it  enables 
an  adversary  to  call  the  kettle  black,  Germany,  in  my  opinion,  in 
the  circumstances  in  which  the  blockade  placed  her,  was  justified 
in  her  turn  in  attempting  to  establish  a  blockade  of  her  enemies' 
coast -lines  by  the  unrestricted  use  of  the  submarine.  If  this  action 
was  an  infringement  of  international  law  and  the  (fictitious)  rights 
of  neutrals,  then  those  neutral  countries  which  were  affected 
should  have  supported  their  rights  by  declaring  war  on  the  law- 
breaker. In  place,  most  of  these  weedlings  howled  with  injured 
innocence  and  continued  to  make  money  out  of  the  battlefields 
they  were  too  prudent  or  too  cowardly  to  approach.  There  can 
be  no  doubt  that,  by  instituting  unrestricted  submarine  warfare, 
the  Germans  violated  certain  laws  of  war  made  long  before  the 
advent  of  this  weapon  ;  but  also  can  there  be  no  doubt  that,  if 
the  slow  starvation  of  German  men,  women  and  children  by 
means  of  investment  did  not  contravene  the  spirit  of  international 

*  "  Science  and  the  Great  War,"  E.  B.  Poulton,  D.Sc,  M.A.,  pp  31-32. 
In  December,  19 13,  Holland  imported  i\  million  tons  of  cocoa  ;  in  December, 
1914,  imports  in  cocoa  rose  to  7$  million  tons.  On  account  of  the  abnormal 
tonnage  of  oranges  sent  to  Germany  "  on  the  Empress's  birthday  every  German 
soldier  was  presented  with  a  pot  of  marmalade  !  " 

7 


98  The  Reformation  of  War 

law,  then  neither  did  unrestricted  submarine  warfare  contravene 
it,  though  it  may  have  infringed  the  letter  of  the  tradition  which 
this  law  had  created.  If  starvation  is  right  in  one  case  it  is  right 
in  both.  The  drowning  of  non-combatants  is  but  an  incident  in 
the  operation  of  killing  by  starvation,  it  does  not  affect  the 
principle  underlying  this  act.  Further,  it  should  be  realized 
that,  as  long  as  international  law  is  so  worded  as  to  permit  of 
neutrals  trading  like  ghouls  on  the  blood  of  the  belligerents, 
international  law  is  immoral  and,  consequently,  it  is  a  virtuous 
act  to  destroy  it.  To  foster  it  is  not  only  to  place  a  premium  on 
greed  and  cowardice  but  also  on  moral  prostitution. 

During  the  period  of  the  economic  attack,  the  whole  question 
of  the  security  of  property  on  the  high  seas  was  thrown  into  the 
limelight.  This  question  is  an  old  one,  and  a  very  brief  summary 
of  its  history  is  instructive. 

Up  to  the  middle  of  the  fourteenth  century,  capture  at  sea 

was  practically  unrestricted.     Then  we  find  several  of  the  leading 

European  nations  binding  themselves  by  an  agreement  known 

as  the  "  Consolat-del-Mar,"  in  which  it  was  laid  down  that  only 

enemy  property,  either  ships  or  cargo,  was  liable  to  capture  and 

that  neutral  ships  and  cargo  were  not.     During  the  Crimean 

War,   both  Great  Britain  and   France  agreed  not  to  capture 

enemy's  goods  in  neutral  ships  or  neutral  goods  in  enemy  ships. 

In  1856,  Great  Britain  became  party  to  the  Declaration  of  Paris, 

and  hung  a  millstone  round  her  neck  by  agreeing  to  exempt 

from  capture  enemy's  goods  in  neutral  ships  and  neutral  goods 

in  enemy  ships,  subject  to  the  exception  of  contrabands.     In 

187 1  Lord    Salisbury    said  :     "  Since  the  Declaration  of  Paris 

the  fleet,  valuable  as  it  is  for  preventing  an  invasion  of  these 

shores,  is  almost  valueless  for  any  other  purpose,"  and  shortly 

before  the  outbreak  of  war,  in  19 14,  Major  J.  A.  Longridge  wrote  : 

"  The  Declaration  of  Paris  curtails  the  offensive  power  of  the  only 
weapon  with  which,  in  the  absence  of  an  army  of  continental  pro- 
portions, she  (i.e.  Great  Britain)  can  make  good  her  word  when  she 
speaks  with  her  enemies  in  the  gate."* 

*  "  The  Liability  of  Forfeiture  of  National   Oversea  Commerce,"     Major 
J.  A.  Longridge.     "  The  Army  Review,"  Vol.  VI.,  April,  1914. 


The  Last  Lap  of  the  Physical  Epoch         99 

If  sufficient  harm  had  not  already  been  accomplished  by 
depriving  the  fleet  of  an  economic  objective,  shortly  before  the 
war,  the  British  Government  contemplated  a  further  restriction 
of  her  naval  powers  by  considering  very  favourably  the  terms 
of  the  Declaration  of  London  ;  fortunately  for  the  Empire  this 
Declaration  was  still  unratified  when  hostilities  began. 

From  the  opening  of  the  war  onwards,  few  opportunities  of 
a  surreptitious  nature  were  missed  by  Great  Britain  to  file  through 
the  shackles  of  the  Declaration  of  Paris,  and  when  we  view  these 
attempts  from  an  impartial  point  of  view,  there  can  be  little 
doubt  that,  technically  at  least,  Germany  was  right  in  stating 
that  we  had  violated  the  terms  of  this  Declaration,  and  that, 
consequently,  she  in  her  turn  was  free  to  torpedo  ships  at  sight. 
Here,  again,  can  we  learn  another  lesson  concerning  the  dangers 
of  rules  based  on  pseudo-humanitarian  vapourings.  The  Declara- 
tion of  Paris  was  a  pacifical  measure  adopted  to  restrict  the  horrors 
of  war  ;  it  was  not  based  on  common-sense  or  human  nature,  and 
what  happened  was  pre-ordained.  Having  agreed  to  it  in  peace 
time,  Great  Britain  tried  to  wriggle  out  of  it  in  war  time,  with  the 
inevitable  result  that  Germany  made  these  wriggles  an  excuse 
to  institute  a  form  of  warfare  which  was,  from  the  standpoint 
of  the  signatories  of  the  Declaration,  more  barbarous  than  any 
type  of  warfare  yet  contemplated. 

In  the  German  economic  campaign,  one  cardinal  military 
error  was  made — it  was  declared  too  early.  Had  the  Germans 
delayed  their  declaration  until  the  end  of  1917,  and  then  launched 
an  unrestricted  submarine  war  backed  by  two  hundred  to  three 
hundred  of  these  vessels,  they  would  have  forced  their  will  on 
Great  Britain  before  the  middle  of  the  following  year,  and  America 
would  have  been  left  completely  out  of  the  picture.  In  fact, 
like  ourselves  in  the  Gallipoli  campaign,  if  they  had  not  prema- 
turely shown  their  naval  claws,  they  might,  in  spite  of  the  stale- 
mate on  land,  have  ended  the  war  victoriously  by  the  use  of  sea 
power.  To-day,  if  we  close  our  eyes  to  this  fact  and  attempt 
to  banish  the  submarine  by  incantations  on  the  lines  of  the 
Declarations  of  Paris  or  London,  we  may,  at  some  day  in  the 

7* 


ioo  The  Reformation  of  War 

future,  suddenly  open  them  to  find  starvation  staring  us  in  the 
face. 

If  we  examine  the  basic  ideas  underlying  this  whole  period  of 
righting,  we  shall  find,  as  was  the  case  in  all  former  wars,  that 
killing  was  the  supreme  object.  Soldiers  have  killed  soldiers 
since  times  immemorial ;  consequently,  killing,  which  is  but  a 
means  of  enforcing  the  will  of  one  nation  on  another,  has  mono- 
polized the  whole  horizon  of  warfare.  The  submarine  taught 
the  civilized  nations  of  the  world  that  there  were  other  means 
of  compelling  a  nation  to  accept  the  will  of  its  adversary,  and, 
though  its  use  resulted  in  men  and  even  women  and  children 
being  killed,  the  numbers  destroyed  were  insignificant  when 
compared  to  the  numbers  killed  by  traditional  methods.  Thus, 
we  come  to  the  conclusion  that  it  was  not  the  killing  of  non- 
combatants  which  was  the  real  crime,  for  in  modern  warfare 
it  is  pure  sophistry  to  attempt  to  draw  a  line  between  those  who 
fight  and  those  who  assist  the  fighters,  since  entire  nations  go  to 
war.  Instead,  that  it  was  the  novelty  of  the  means,  in  spite 
of  their  low  killing  power,  which  horrified  those  who  were  attacked ; 
for,  not  having  grown  accustomed  to  these  means,  they  were  not 
prepared  to  defend  themselves  against  them. 

Nearly  all  new  methods  of  waging  war  have,  in  the  past, 
humanized  the  art.  Thus,  the  most  brutal  form  of  warfare  is 
axe  warfare,  the  hand-to-hand  struggle  which  ends  in  the  ex- 
termination of  one  side.  Musket  warfare  humanized  axe  warfare, 
and,  in  the  last  great  war,  the  submarine,  aeroplane,  gas  and  tank 
humanized  that  condition  of  warfare  which,  by  1914,  had  grown 
into  a  traditional  art. 

A  novel  weapon  or  means  of  warfare,  like  an  unknown  plague, 
fills  the  imagination  of  man  with  horror  and  intangible  fear. 
Yet,  no  remedy  to  this  is  to  be  obtained  by  locking  up  terror 
in  a  mental  dungeon ;  in  place,  the  unknown  must  be  examined 
in  broad  daylight,  its  nature  diagnosed  and  its  antidote  discovered. 

The  underlying  factor  throughout  the  whole  of  this  period 
of  the  economic  attack  was  that,  as  the  fighting  forces  are  main- 
tained by  the  country  to  which  they  belong,  they  can,  under 


The  Last  Lap  of  the  Physical  Epoch       101 

modern  conditions,  be  attacked  indirectly  by  the  delivery  of 
direct  attack  on  the  nation  itself.  Siege  warfare  nearly  always 
demands  a  costly  process  of  attrition,  and  never  more  so  than 
when  an  entire  nation  has  to  be  besieged  and  starved  into  sub- 
mission. In  the  next  Chapter  I  will  show  that,  towards  the  end 
of  the  Great  War,  a  more  economical  method  of  attack  was 
taking  form,  a  method  which  in  the  future  may  compel  an  entire 
nation  to  throw  up  its  hands  and  crave  peace  within  a  few  days, 
possibly  hours,  of  a  war  being  declared. 


V 

THE    FIRST  LAP   OF  THE   MORAL   EPOCH 

IN  the  last  Chapter  I  examined  the  traditional  aspect  of 
the  Great  War  and  the  main  phases  which  out-cropped 
from  it.  I  pointed  out,  as  far  as  space  would  allow,  that  the 
theory  underlying  the  war  was  that  of  enforcing  policy  by  de- 
struction of  life  and  of  property.  The  question  may  now  be  asked, 
if  this  theory  is  fundamentally  unsound,  how  comes  it  that  it  has 
prevailed  since  times  immemorable  ?  The  answer  is  not  difficult 
to  arrive  at,  when  it  is  realized  that  national  wars,  in  their  modern 
aspect,  are  but  correlatives  of  modern  civilization,  which,  since 
the  introduction  of  steam-power,  especially  in  the  form  of  the 
steamship  and  locomotive,  has  been  completely  revolutionized. 
With  the  adoption  of  steam  as  a  motive  force,  we  see  simul- 
taneously introduced  a  physical  world  contraction  and  an  in- 
tellectual world  expansion.  While,  in  1750,  it  took  three  weeks 
to  travel  from  Caithness  to  London,  to-day  Bombay,  Cape  Town, 
San  Francisco  and  Vladivostock  can  be  reached  in  a  similar 
time.  Intellectually,  what  did  this  mean  ?  It  meant  that,  as 
space  shrank,  intelligence  expanded  through  travel  and  rapidity 
of  communication.  In  1759,  the  news  of  the  capture  of  Quebec 
took  several  weeks  before  it  was  received  in  London  ;  yet,  in 
192 1,  the  result  of  the  Carpentier-Dempsey  fight  was  announced 
to  the  whole  of  Paris  within  three  minutes  of  the  knock-out  blow 
being  delivered  ! 

This  intellectual  and  moral  revolution,  which  was  brought 
about  through  a  growth  in  the  physical  sciences,  was  not  grasped 
by  the  military  mind.     It  was  not  realized  that,  while  only  a 

102 


The  First  Lap  of  the  Moral  Epoch         103 

hundred  years  ago,  it  took  days  and  weeks  and  months  before 
a  moral  blow  could  be  delivered,  to-day  it  only  takes  minutes 
and  hours.  It  was  not  realized  that,  while  in  the  year  1800, 
the  nervous  system  of  a  civilized  nation  was  of  a  low  and  gang- 
lionic order,  by  1900  it  had  become  highly  sensitive  and  central- 
ized. It  was  not  realized  that,  as  the  whole  aspect  of  civilization 
had  changed,  so  also  must  the  whole  aspect  of  warfare  be  changed, 
and,  as  science  had  accomplished  the  civil  changes,  so  also  must 
science  accomplish  the  military  ones. 

In  19 14,  what  happened  was  this :  unless  the  war  could  be 
won  within  a  few  weeks  of  its  outbreak,  armies,  as  then  organized, 
could  not,  under  probable  circumstances,  maintain  or  enforce 
the  peace  policies  of  their  respective  governments,  because  these 
armies,  in  constitution,  belonged  to  a  social  epoch  which  was  dead 
and  gone.  For  over  a  hundred  years  civilization  had  been  built 
upon  science  and  steam-power,  yet,  in  1914,  armies  were  still 
organized  on  muscle-power,  the  power  upon  which  nations  had 
been  constituted  prior  to  the  advent  of  the  steam-engine,  the 
dynamo  and  the  petrol-engine,  the  telegraph  and  the  telephone. 
As  the  main  target  in  war — the  will  of  the  nation — grew  in  size 
through  intellectual  expansion  and  sensitiveness,  so  do  we  see, 
in  order  to  protect  these  targets,  armies  becoming,  not  more 
intelligent  and  more  scientific,  but  more  brutal,  ton  upon  ton  of 
human  flesh  being  added,  until  war  strengths  are  reckoned  in 
millions  in  place  of  thousands  of  men. 

This  idea  of  human  tonnage  was  a  veritable  hallucination, 
which  became  apparent  when,  in  August,  1914,  the  first  machine 
gun  sent  its  bullets  zip-zipping  over  the  battlefield.  This 
hallucination,  thereupon,  began  to  volatilize,  for  the  soldier, 
however  well  he  may  have  been  trained,  always  remains  a  creature 
controlled  by  his  instinct  of  self-preservation.  What  did  this 
instinct  do  ?  For  the  next  four  years,  at  first  unconsciously, 
then  more  and  more  consciously,  it  urged  the  soldier  to  make  good 
his  hundred  years  of  scientific  neglect.  Invention  was  thereupon 
piled  upon  invention,  but  the  killing  theory  still  held  the  field, 
until  towards  the  close  of  the  war  it  became  apparent  to  some 


104  The  Reformation  of  War 

that  science  was  so  powerful  that  it  could  even  dispense  with 
the  age-old  custom  of  killing  and  could  do  something  far  more 
effective — it  could  petrify  the  human  mind  with  fear.  It  could, 
in  fact,  directly  dictate  the  will  of  one  nation  to  another,  and  with 
vastly  reduced  bloodshed.  It  could,  in  fact,  enforce  policy  with 
far  less  detriment  to  the  eventual  peace  than  had  ever  been 
possible  before.  The  idea  of  the  moral  shock,  in  place  of  the 
physical  assault,  was  just  beginning  to  flutter  over  the  blood- 
soaked  battlefields  when  the  Armistice  of  November  n,  1918, 
brought  hostilities  to  a  close.  Since  that  date  this  idea  has 
been  reduced  from  a  dynamic  force  to  a  mere  kinetic  energy,  by 
solemn  international  ignorance  of  the  meaning  and  object  of  war. 
In  1921,  at  Washington,  the  aim  of  the  Disarmament  Conference 
was  to  restrict  the  outbreak  of  war  and  to  render  warfare  less 
brutal,  yet  the  action  taken  there,  as  I  shall  prove,  was  to  render 
wars  more  likely  and  to  maintain  armies  on  a  footing  which, 
when  the  next  great  war  engulfs  society,  will  once  again  demand 
its  million  tons  of  flesh.  I  will  now  return  to  the  war  of  1914- 
1918. 

If  we  examine  the  history  of  siege  warfare,  we  shall  soon 
discover  that  the  causes  of  surrender,  in  order  of  importance, 
have  been  :  treachery,  starvation  and  assault.  Here  we  obtain 
three  different  means  of  accomplishing  a  siege — the  attack  on  the 
moral  of  the  defenders,  the  attack  on  the  resources  of  the 
defenders  and  the  attack  on  the  defences  of  the  defenders.  I 
have  already  dealt  with  the  second  and  third  of  these  means,  I 
will  now  examine  the  first. 

I  will  first  inquire  into  the  meaning  of  treachery  as  applied 
to  war,  for  it  is  an  ugly  word*  and  its  unenviable  reputation  may, 
in  the  minds  of  some,  obliterate  its  tremendous  power.  Treachery 
is  a  violation  of  allegiance,  the  highest  form  of  which  is  the 
co-operation  of  the  individuals  composing  a  nation  in  the  main- 
tenance of  the  nation's  free  existence.  For  an  individual,  who 
shares  in  common  with  others  the  prosperity  of  the  nation  to  which 

*  An  American  writer  defines  strategy  as  follows  :     "  When  practised  by 
Indians  it  is  called  treachery  " — which  is  very  true. 


The  First  Lap  of  the  Moral  Epoch         105 

he  belongs,  to  refuse,  for  some  selfish  reason,  to  secure  the  nation 
against  the  aggression  of  an  enemy,  is  an  act  of  treachery.  All 
acts  of  war  ultimately  aim  at  creating  a  state  of  treachery  in 
an  enemy ;  in  other  words,  their  object  is  to  reduce  the  enemy's 
moral  to  so  low  a  point  that  he  is  willing  to  set  aside  his  national 
existence  or  policy,  and  accept  the  will  of  his  adversary. 
Treachery,  in  its  military  meaning,  is  demoralization,  and,  if  we 
once  get  the  nasty  taste  of  the  word  out  of  our  mouths,  we  shall 
realize  that,  if  by  inducing  a  state  of  faithlessness  or  demoralization 
in  an  enemy  we  can  more  speedily  win  a  war  than  by  force  of 
arms  or  starvation,  we  have  every  right  to  use  treachery  as  a 
weapon.  By  this  I  do  not  mean  that  we  should  behave  like 
barbarians,  or  that  we  should  fire  at  an  enemy  under  a  flag  of 
truce,  or  promise  him  terms  of  surrender  we  have  no  intention 
of  carrying  out ;  but  that  to  attack  the  will  of  the  enemy's  army 
and  his  civil  population  by  a  rapid  means  is  quite  as  honourable 
an  act  of  war  as  to  attack  it  by  a  slow  means,  such  as  shooting 
down  his  soldiers,  sinking  his  ships  and  starving  his  women  and 
children. 

I  will  now  examine  this  question  from  a  very  simple  stand- 
point. In  a  besieged  town  or  fortress,  what  human  elements 
within  it  have,  in  the  past,  proved  the  most  receptive  to 
treachery  ?  Undoubtedly  the  civil  elements.  The  reason  for 
this  is  self-apparent ;  soldiers  are  controlled  by  discipline, 
civilians  by  fear.  Consequently,  the  main  targets  of  the  moral 
attack  are  the  civil  inhabitants  of  the  country  attacked,  for 
if  their  will  can  be  corrupted,  however  well  disciplined  may 
their  soldiers  and  sailors  be,  their  organization  will  become 
affected  by  the  general  rot  which  has  undermined  the  stability 
of  their  government.  A  nation  septic  with  revolution  can 
no  more  wage  an  organized  war  than  can  a  man,  contorted 
with  colic,  shoot  snipe.  This  was  the  lesson  which  Russia 
taught  Europe  in  1917,  and  yet,  at  that  time,  the  Allied  press 
was  unanimous  in  pronouncing  the  revolution  to  be  a  glorious 
war-winning  event  ! 

On  the  declaration  of  war,  in  August,  1914,  the  moral  attack 


106  The  Reformation  of  War 

opened  like  a  labour  conference ;  the  contending  newspapers 
collected  dirt  from  the  gutters  of  their  respective  Fleet  Streets 
and  threw  it  into  each  other's  faces.  Later  on  in  the  war,  the 
journalists  were  drilled  into  some  form  of  order,  and  well- 
organized  paper  attacks  were  launched,  treachery  finding  its 
extreme  limit  in  the  fictitious  and  comic  discovery  of  the  Ger- 
man Corpse  Factories.  Curious  to  relate  that,  though  the 
power  of  the  press,  as  a  means  of  demoralization,  was  fully 
realized  by  the  British  Government,  its  enormous  power  to 
moralize  the  British  Nation  was  never  made  use  of.  Being 
completely  cut  off  from  the  realities  of  war  by  a  short-sighted 
censorship,  the  press  was  never  able  to  bring  the  people  into 
touch  with  these  realities  and,  consequently,  into  contact  with 
their  true  responsibilities.  The  people  being  thus  rendered 
inarticulate,  the  government  was  unable  to  ascertain  the  popular 
sentiment  on  any  great  question,  and  when  a  crisis  had  to  be 
faced,  not  knowing  how  the  nation  might  take  it,  decision  was 
obscured  by  ambiguous  action,  which  always  permitted  of 
numerous  lines  of  retirement  should  eventually  the  people 
object.  What  the  politicians  never  realized  was  that,  during 
war  time,  the  supreme  duty  of  government  is  to  take  the  nation 
into  their  full  confidence  ;  for,  when  national  existence  is  at 
stake,  popular  opinion  (intuition)  is  nearly  always  healthy  and 
virile.  The  medium  between  the  government  and  the  people, 
and  between  the  people  and  the  nation's  army,  fleet,  and  air 
force,  is  the  daily  press  ;  during  the  war,  this  medium,  in  place  of 
being  rendered  fluid,  was  solidified  by  the  chill  blast  of  political 
fear. 

Besides  the  newspaper-attack,  the  propitiation  of  neutrals 
was  extensively  made  use  of  as  a  means  of  undermining  the 
moral  of  the  enemy's  government.  Looking  back  on  the  results, 
it  is  very  doubtful  whether  this  diplomatic  attack  did  more 
damage  to  the  enemy  or  to  ourselves.  The  reason  was  that 
the  government  relied  more  on  cajolery  than  on  outspokenness. 
British  diplomatic  action  in  Turkey,  Bulgaria  and  Greece,  during 
19 14,  was  a  grotesque  failure,  and  there  can  be  little  doubt  that, 


The  First  Lap  of  the  Moral  Epoch         107 

during  the  period  which  preceded  America's  entry  into  the  war, 
the  government  was  quite  as  concerned  with  pleasing  the  United 
States  as  with  beating  Germany.  In  place  of  winning  over  the 
Americans — a  virile  nation — by  frankness,  this  action,  though 
it  may  have  flattered  President  Wilson,  withheld  from  the 
people  of  that  great  country  the  seriousness  of  the  Allies'  position 
in  Europe.  This  want  of  straight  talking  undoubtedly  lengthened 
the  war.  What  no  government  appeared  to  realize,  and  Germany 
least  of  all,  was  that  the  poles  of  the  magnet  which  attract 
all  neutrals  worth  attracting  are  straight-fighting  and  straight- 
speaking,  and  why  ?  Because  the  winners  of  the  war  will,  in 
the  peace  which  must  one  day  follow  it,  exert  more  control  over 
neutrals  than  the  losers ;  consequently,  it  was  to  the  future 
advantage  of  the  world  that  the  "  cleanest ':  nations  should 
win. 

Besides  the  purely  civil  means  of  attacking  the  moral  of 
a  nation  I  will  now  turn  to  the  military  means.  In  traditional 
warfare,  it  was  the  rule  that  armies  attacked  armies  and  not 
non-combatants.  If  this  tradition  were  strictly  adhered  to, 
then  the  demoralization  of  the  enemy  could  only  be  effected 
by  the  destruction  of  the  enemy's  army  and  fleet.  This  process 
proved  a  most  bloody  one,  and,  during  the  war,  adherence  to 
it  resulted  in  appalling  slaughter.  It  should  here  be  once  again 
remembered  that  the  more  bloodless  a  war  is,  the  more  prosperous 
and  contented  will  the  peace,  which  follows  the  war,  be  for  all 
concerned.  For  example,  if,  during  the  recent  war,  Germany 
could  have  been  forced  to  disband  her  army  and  scrap  her 
navy  by  a  sudden  and  enormous  loss  of  national  moral,  which 
entailed  little  bloodshed  and  small  damage  to  her  industries, 
would  not  the  world  to-day  be  a  more  prosperous  and  contented 
habitation  for  man  than  it  actually  is  ?  There  can  be  no  two 
answers  to  this  question.  And,  supposing  even  if  this  sudden 
blow  had  cost  the  lives  of  a  few  thousand  German  women  and 
children,  would  this  loss  have  rendered  this  novel  type  of  war- 
fare immoral  ?  Certainly,  if  the  killing  of  men  is  to  be  considered 
moral   while    the   killing   of    women    and    children,    under    all 


108  The  Reformation  of  War 

circumstances,  is  an  immoral  act.  The  colossal  fallacy  of  this 
argument  is  to  be  sought  in  the  fact  that  traditional  warfare 
will  persistently  and  blindly  think  of  killing  or  not-killing  as 
objectives  in  war.  When,  however,  it  is  realized  that  to  enforce 
a  policy,  and  not  to  kill,  is  the  objective,  and  that  the  policy 
of  a  nation,  though  maintained  and  enforced  by  her  sailors 
and  soldiers,  is  not  fashioned  by  them,  but  by  the  civil  popula- 
tion, surely,  then,  if  a  few  civilians  get  killed  in  the  struggle  they 
have  nothing  to  complain  of — "  dulce  et  decorum  est  pro  patria 
mori."  And,  if  they  will  not  accept  these  words  as  their  motto, 
then,  in  my  opinion,  their  governments  should  altogether  abstain 
from  war,  however  much  they  may  be  spat  upon. 

Morality  is  not  a  fixed  quantity,  it  is  not  a  law  of  Nature, 
but  a  dynamic  and  invigorating  social  force.  It,  again,  is  not 
an  end  in  itself,  but  a  means  towards  an  end — peaceful  national 
survival.  Slaughter  is  the  negation  of  survival ;  consequently, 
as  the  incidence  of  slaughter  is  reduced,  the  more  moral,  in  the 
natural  meaning  of  the  word,  does  warfare  become. 

I  will  now  examine  certain  means  of  warfare  which  were 
used  during  the  Great  War,  the  future  developments  of  which, 
I  believe,  will,  while  minimizing  bloodshed  and  ruin,  prove 
adequate  in  order  to  enforce  policy. 

Nearly  all  new  inventions  in  war,  and  not  a  few  in  industry, 
have  been  attributed  to  his  Satanic  Majesty,  who  must,  indeed, 
be  the  greatest  of  all  inventors,  but,  curious  to  relate,  eventually 
all  these  inventions  have  made  warfare  more  and  more  humane 
and  less  and  less  frequent.  If  this  progress  continue,  it  is  quite 
conceivable  that  from  the  week-end  wars  of  the  Middle  Ages, 
we  may,  in  the  future,  expect  wars  once  a  century,  once  every 
two  centuries,  until  warfare,  as  we  know  it  to-day,  is  looked 
upon  as  a  kind  of  international  cannibalism  and  nations  lose 
their  taste  for  blood. 

When  warfare  was  very  simple  in  nature,  the  soldier  shot 
arrows  at  his  antagonist ;  later  on  he  fired  cannon  balls,  and  as 
these  played  terrible  havoc  when  they  bounded  through  close 
masses  of  troops,  consequently  the  infantry  opened  their  ranks 


The  First  Lap  of  the  Moral  Epoch         109 

in  order  to  avoid  destruction.  This  rather  disconcerted  the 
gunner,  so  he  invented  the  shell  and  the  shrapnel  howitzer, 
and,  when  the  opposing  infantry  found  out,  as  they  did  very 
early  in  the  Great  War,  that  it  was  useless  to  open  the  ranks  any 
further,  they  dug  trenches  and  went  to  earth.  Once  again  was 
the  gunner  disconcerted,  and,  while  he  was  attempting  to  dig 
the  infantry  out  of  their  trenches  by  means  of  shells,  a  very 
expensive  operation,  a  cunning  German,  following  on  the  lines 
proposed  by  Lord  Dundonald  in  1854,  replaced  steel  particles 
by  gas  particles,  so  that  a  whole  area  and  all  the  targets  included 
in  it,  either  above  ground  or  beneath,  might  be  hit. 

On  April  22,  1915,  the  Germans  put  this  idea  into  practice 
east  of  Ypres,  and  inaugurated  a  mode  of  warfare  which  I  believe 
is  destined  to  revolutionize  the  whole  art.  They  made,  however, 
two  cardinal  mistakes  :  first,  they  used  lethal  gas — chlorine, 
which  was  totally  unnecessary,  especially  so  as  the  Hague 
Convention  did  not  forbid  the  use  of  gases  of  a  non-toxic  nature  ; 
secondly,  they  did  not  use  sufficient  of  it  for  the  winning  of  a 
decisive  battle.  Had  they  really  understood  the  meaning  of 
gas  they  could  have  won  the  war. 

The  effects,  though  restricted,  were  immediate  and  appalling, 
the  French  and  British  troops  fell  back  gasping  for  breath. 
They  could  do  nothing  else,  for  all  their  peace  training  and 
equipment  were  useless  against  this  new  death.  Consequently, 
tradition  was  shocked  to  the  marrow,  and,  without  thought,  the 
whole  civilized  world  shuddered  with  horror,  and  gas,  like 
gunpowder,  chloroform  and  the  locomotive,  was  pronounced  to 
be  the  invention  of  the  Devil. 

The  horrors  of  gas  warfare  have  been  so  well  advertised 
that  the  very  enthusiasm  shown  by  its  execrators  should  make 
us  pause  and  think.  What  are  the  facts  ?  The  main  fact,  as 
regards  the  brutality  of  this  type  of  warfare,  is  to  be  discovered 
in  the  casualty  lists.  As  regards  their  own  losses,  the  American 
General  Staff  have  carefully  categorized  them ;  they  are  as 
follows  : 

The  total  number  of  casualties  resulting  from   all  causes 


no  The  Reformation  of  War 

was  274,217.  Of  these  74,779,  or  27.3  per  cent.,  were  due  to 
gas.  Of  the  gas  casualties  only  1,400,  or  1.87  per  cent.,  resulted 
in  death.  Of  the  remaining  199,438  casualties,  resulting  from 
bullets,  shell  fire,  etc.,  46,659,  or  23.4  per  cent.,  proved  fatal. 
Here,  then,  are  the  facts  regarding  these  alleged  horrors.  Well 
may  the  compilers  of  this  report  conclude  it  by  saying  : 

"  In  other  words,  gas  is  twelve  times  as  humane  as  bullets  and 
high  explosives.  That  is  to  say,  if  a  man  gets  gassed  on  the 
battlefield  he  has  twelve  times  as  many  chances  to  get  well  as  if 
he  is  struck  by  bullets  and  high  explosives. u 

Further  than  this,  the  permanent  injuries  resulting  from 
gas-wounding  are  far  less  numerous  than  those  inflicted  by  the 
use  of  traditional  weapons.  At  the  Meeting  of  the  British 
Association  of  1919,  Brigadier-General  H.  Hartley,  an  expert 
chemist,  said  : 

"  The  death-rate  among  gas  casualties  was  much  lower  than  that 
among  casualties  of  other  causes,  and  not  only  was  the  death-rate 
lower,  but  a  much  smaller  proportion  of  the  injured  suffered  any 
permanent  disability.  There  is  no  comparison  between  the  per- 
manent damage  caused  by  gas,  and  the  suffering  caused  to  those 
who  were  maimed  and  blinded  by  shell  and  rifle-fire.*  It  is  now 
generally  admitted  that  in  the  later  stages  of  the  war  many  military 
objects  could  be  attained  with  less  suffering  by  using  gas  than  by  any 
other  means." 

I  have  already  stated,  more  than  once,  that  killing  is  not 
the  objective  in  war.     If  this  statement  be  accepted,  then,  as 

*  Pacifists  and  adherents  of  the  traditional  war  school  have  deliberately 
attempted  to  discredit  chemical  warfare  by  stating  that  gas  has  blinded 
thousands  of  men  and  affected  tens  of  thousands  with  tuberculosis.  The  facts 
of  the  case  are  as  follows  : 

(i.)  Blinding.  During  the  war  the  Americans  had  eighty-six  men  totally 
blinded,  forty-four  partially  blinded  and  six  hundred  and  forty-four 
blinded  in  one  eye.  Of  the  gassed  patients  four  were  blinded  in  both 
eyes  and  twenty-five  in  one  eye. 

(ii.)  In  the  year  1918  there  were  one  and  a  half  times  as  many  cases  of 
tuberculosis  per  thousand  among  all  American  troops  in  France  as  there 
were  amongst  those  gassed.  In  1919  there  were  more  than  one  and 
three-quarter  times  as  many  tuberculosis  cases  per  thousand  among 
all  troops  as  there  were  among  the  gassed. 

The  Report  of  the  Surgeon-General  U.S.A.  Army,  1920. 


The  First  Lap  of  the  Moral  Epoch         ill 

bloodshed  is  uneconomical,  surely  an  attempt  should  be  made 
to  devise  a  means  of  forcing  an  enemy  to  change  his  policy  by 
bloodlessly  defeating  his  army.  Gas  warfare  enables  us  to  do 
this,  for  there  is  no  reason  why  gases  as  weapons  should  be  of 
a  lethal  nature.  In  the  last  war  they  were  frequently  so,  because 
soldiers  and  the  civil  suppliers  of  soldiers  had  become  so 
accustomed  to  think  in  terms  of  killing,  that,  when  gas  was  pro- 
posed as  a  weapon,  they  at  once  looked  upon  gas  in  the  form 
of  a  microscopic  bullet. 

On  July  12,  1917,  at  the  third  battle  of  Ypres,  the  Germans 
gave  up  this  idea,  and,  by  making  use  of  a  chemical  commonly 
known  as  mustard  gas,  disclosed  to  the  whole  world  the  future 
possibilities  of  gas  warfare.  Respirators  to  a  great  extent 
were  now  useless,  for  the  persistent  and  vesicant  nature  of  this 
chemical  rendered  whole  areas,  for  days  on  end,  uninhabitable 
and  dangerous  to  cross.  Men  carried  the  oily  liquid  on  their 
clothes,  on  the  mud  of  their  boots,  and  infected  dug-outs,  billets 
and  rest  camps  far  back  on  the  lines  of  communication.  Few 
died,  but  many  were  incapacitated  for  months  on  end.  Here, 
curious  to  relate,  is  the  true  power  of  gas  as  a  weapon — it  can 
incapacitate  without  killing.  A  dead  man  says  nothing,  and, 
when  once  buried,  is  no  encumbrance  to  the  survivors.  A 
wounded  man  will  spread  the  wildest  of  rumours,  will  exaggerate 
dangers,  foster  panic,  and  requires  the  attention  of  others  to 
heal  him — until  he  dies  or  is  cured,  he  is  a  military  encumbrance 
and  a  demoralizing  a.gent.  Gas,  as  I  will  show  later  on,  is, 
par  excellence,  the  weapon  of  demoralization,  and,  as  it  can 
terrorize  without  necessarily  killing,  it,  more  than  any  other 
known  weapon,  can  enforce  economically  the  policy  of  one 
nation  on  another.     I  will  now  turn  to  air  warfare. 

For  military  purposes  the  aeroplane  had  been  made  use  of 
before  the  advent  of  the  Great  War,  both  in  Mexico  and  Tripoli, 
but  it  was  only  during  the  Great  War  that,  in  spite  of  tradi- 
tional jealousy,  its  immense  powers  became  manifest.  At 
first  a  mere  adjunct  to  the  older  services  on  land  and  sea,  within 
three  years  it  won  its  independence,  for  not  only  could  it  hop 


112  The  Reformation  of  War 

over  armies  and  fleets  and  attack  the  brains  of  these  forces, 
but  it  could  attack  the  moral  of  the  government  defended  by 
these  forces,  and,  above  all,  the  will  of  the  nation  upon  which 
the  power  of  government  is  founded. 

The  Germans  were,  I  believe,  the  first  of  the  belligerents  to 
bombard  an  open  town  from  the  air,  and  such  action,  being  a 
novelty,  met  with  universal  execration.  Nevertheless,  it  was  not 
long  before  the  Allies  retaliated  in  what  was  known  as  baby- 
killing,  but  which  in  truth  was  the  direct  attack  on  the  source  of 
all  military  power — the  nerves  and  will  of  the  civil  population. 

As  it  cannot  be  more  immoral  to  bomb  a  town  than  to  bom- 
bard it,  does  the  immorality  of  an  aeroplane  attack  lie  in  the 
fact  that,  while  in  a  bombardment  the  slaughter  of  women  and 
children  is  but  an  unfortunate  incident,  in  an  aerial  attack  on  a 
town  the  terrorization  of  its  civil  inhabitants  becomes  the  main 
object  ?  I  believe  that  this  is  the  popular  conception,  simply 
because  civilians  have  not  yet  grasped  the  fact  that :  when 
nations  go  to  war  the  entire  population  of  each  country  concerned  is 
ranged  against  the  other,  and  that  the  solidarity  of  their  fighting 
forces  is  founded  on  the  civil  will.  The  justifiableness  of  such 
attacks  was  clearly  pointed  out  by  Mr.  Lanchester  as  long  ago  as 
1 91 5,  when  he  wrote  : 

"It  is  futile  to  attempt  to  disguise  the  self-evident  fact  that  a 
serious  attack  on  the  capital  city  of  an  enemy,  containing  in  its  heart 
the  administrative  centre  both  of  his  Army  and  Navy,  in  addition 
to  the  headquarters  of  his  Government,  cannot  be  regarded  other 
than  as  a  legitimate  act  of  war.  No  international  agreement  or 
contention  can  make  it  otherwise.  .  .  .  There  is  really  no  escape 
from  this.  Unquestionably  the  destruction  of  a  capital  city,  such  as 
London,  with  the  administrative  centres  aforesaid,  would  be  a  military 
achievement  of  the  first  order  of  magnitude  ;  it  would  be,  from  an 
enemy  standpoint,  an  achievement  of  far  greater  potential  value 
than  any  ordinary  success  or  victory  on  the  field  of  battle."* 

Apparent  as  this  fact  is,  it  was  only  towards  the  end  of  the 
Great  War  that  the  various  belligerents  began  to  realize  what  an 
attack  on  the  social  nerve-centres  really  meant.     Simultaneously, 

*  "  Aircraft  and  Warfare,"  F.  W.  Lanchester,  p.  192. 


The  First  Lap  of  the  Moral  Epoch         113 

they  also  learnt  that  the  body  of  an  army  attacked  by  low  flying 
aeroplanes  was  all  but  helpless.  In  Palestine  and  Syria  the  routed 
Turks  suffered  seriously  from  this  form  of  attack,  so  also  did  the 
retiring  Austrians  in  Italy.  Of  the  last-mentioned  operations, 
Major-General  the  Hon.  S.  F.  Gathorne-Hardy  gives  a  graphic 
description  in  Vol.  III.,  No.  i,  of  the  "  Army  Quarterly."  He  says  : 

"  On  these  two  days  (October  29th,  30th,  1918),  the  Conegliano- 
Pordonone  road  was  black  with  columns  of  all  arms  hurrying  east- 
wards. On  these  the  few  British  squadrons  poured  30,000  rounds 
of  S.A.A.  and  three  and  a  half  tons  of  bombs  from  low  altitude. 
Subsequent  examination  of  the  road  almost  forced  the  observer  to 
the  conclusion  that  this  form  of  warfare  should  be  forbidden  in  the 
future." 

Such  advice  as  this  is  worse  than  useless,  for  difficulties  are 
not  banished  by  words,  and,  if  such  action  were  possible,  either 
mankind  would  become  a  race  of  gods  or  all  progress  would  cease. 
Curious  to  relate,  a  very  similar  suggestion  was  made  by  Baron 
de  Jomini,  who  wrote  his  "  Art  of  War  "  about  one  hundred 
years  ago.     He  says  : 

"  The  means  of  destruction  are  approaching  perfection  with 
frightful  rapidity.  The  Congreve  rockets,  the  effect  and  direction 
of  which  it  is  said  the  Austrians  can  now  regulate.  The  shrapnel 
howitzers,  which  throw  a  stream  of  canister  as  far  as  the  range  of 
a  bullet — the  Perkins  steam  guns,  which  vomit  forth  as  many  balls 
as  a  battalion — will  multiply  the  chances  of  destruction,  as  though 
the  hecatombs  of  Eylau,  Borodino,  Leipsic  and  Waterloo  were  not 
sufficient  to  decimate  the  European  races. 

"  If  governments  do  not  combine  in  a  congress  to  proscribe  these 
inventions  of  destruction,  there  will  be  no  course  left  but  to  make 
the  half  of  any  army  consist  of  cavalry  with  cuirasses,  in  order  to 
capture  with  great  rapidity  these  machines  ;  and  the  infantry,  even, 
will  be  obliged  to  resume  its  armour  of  the  Middle  Ages,  without 
which  a  battalion  will  be  destroyed  before  engaging  the  enemy. 

'  We  may  then  see  again  the  famous  men-at-arms  all  covered 
with  armour,  and  horses  will  require  the  same  protection." 

His  prevision  was  right,  comity  of  nations  could  do  nothing  ; 
common-sense  could  do  much,  and  his  armoured  man  materia- 
lized in  1916  in  the  form  of  the  tank,  yet  another  invention 
which  I  will  now  examine. 

8 


114  The  Reformation  of  War 

For  many  years  before  the  outbreak  of  the  Great  War  the  line 
along  which  tactical  power  was  sought  was  fire,  more  fire  and  yet 
more  fire.  Protection,  except  by  fire  and  by  extensions,  that  is 
by  reduction  in  the  size  of  the  target,  had  been  neglected,  and  in- 
creased means  of  mobility,  except  for  the  railway,  had  scarcely 
been  considered  at  all.  In  1914  (and  for  all  that  still  to-day),  the 
marching-power  of  the  soldier  was  about  the  same  as  it  was  in  the 
days  of  Cheops  and  Sennacherib. 

As  the  type  of  fire  aimed  at  was  rifle-fire,  and  as  it  was  well 
known  that  a  rifle  bullet  could  be  rendered  perfectly  harmless  by 
about  8  mm.  of  armour,  it  is  truly  astonishing,  when  to-day 
we  look  back  on  the  problem,  that,  before  the  outbreak  of  the  war, 
no  single  soldier  of  note  thought  of  using  the  petrol  engine  and 
chain  track  for  the  purpose  of  carrying  armour  in  order  to  protect 
infantry.  The  problem  is  in  nature  so  simple  and  so  self-apparent, 
that  the  only  answer  to  the  question  why  then  was  it  not  thought 
of,  must  be  that  a  tradition,  when  it  becomes  fixed  in  the  mind  of 
man,  exercises  a  hypnotic  influence  over  even  the  most  intelligent, 
and  over  the  less  intelligent  it  is  mentally  a  soporific  drug  and  the 
most  dangerous  "  dope  "  of  all.  So  we  find  that,  since  1870,  the 
entire  General  Staffs  in  the  world  had  been  walking  in  their  sleep. 
Then  suddenly,  in  August,  1914,  they  woke  up  to  discover  that  they 
were  standing  outside  on  the  window-sill  of  a  house  forty-four 
stories  high — the  house  of  traditional  warfare.  Fire-supremacy, 
the  very  instrument  of  victory  which,  for  forty-four  years,  they 
had  been  creating,  drove  friend  and  foe  like  rats  to  earth.  Then 
a  common-sense  man — Colonel  E.  D.  Swinton — came  forward  and 
suggested  the  tank,  and  the  British  War  Office  refused  it  ! 

Thanks  to  Mr.  Winston  Churchill,  who,  in  1914,  was  First  Lord 
of  the  Admiralty,  the  first  tanks  were  produced  and,  on  September 
15,  1916,  they  experienced  their  baptism  of  fire  on  the  battlefield 
of  the  Somme.  At  once  the  British  General  Staff  gave  orders  for 
the  cancellation  of  all  further  production  of  tanks,  but  thanks  to 
Sir  Albert  Stern  this  order  was  rescinded.  From  this  date  on  to 
the  battle  of  Hamel,  on  July  4,  1918,  tanks  had  to  fight  for  their 
existence,  not  against  the  enemy's  opposition  but  against  tradi- 


The  First  Lap  of  the  Moral  Epoch         115 

tion,  and  so  well  did  they  fight  that,  in  1921,  General  Von  Zwehl 
was  able  to  write  :  "  It  was  not  the  genius  of  Marshal  Foch  that 
defeated  us,  but '  General  Tank.'  "* 

I  do  not  intend  here  to  prove  this  assertion,  for  it  has  already 
been  proved  in  many  books  ;  in  place  I  will  simply  take  the  tank 
as  it  existed  during  the  Great  War  and  show  that  in  proportion  as 
it  was  a  life-saving  invention  so  also  was  it  a  demoralizing  agent, 
and,  further,  how  it  was  on  the  point  of  revolutionizing  tactics 
when  the  Armistice  put  an  end  to  the  war. 

On  the  battlefield  of  the  Somme,  in  1916,  it  accomplished 
little  of  a  startling  nature  and  yet  sufficient  to  have  persuaded  all 
but  the  traditionally  blind  that  it  was  a  weapon  wherewith  the 
war  on  land  could  be  won  at  comparatively  small  cost.  On 
September  25,  one  tank,  followed  closely  by  infantry,  moved  along 
about  a  mile  of  trench  line  and  forced  362  Germans  to  surrender 
and  at  a  cost  to  the  infantry  of  five  men  killed  and  wounded. 
The  point  to  note  in  this  small  operation  is  that  the  tank  was  in 
front  of  the  infantry,  a  very  common-sense  position,  for  just  as  a 
man  equipped  with  a  shield  carries  it  in  front  of  him  and  not 
behind  him,  so  when  armoured  machines  accompany  infantry 
their  proper  place  is  in  front ! 

Common-sense  has,  however,  nothing  whatever  to  do  with 
tradition  ;  for,  as  the  tank  operations  which  followed  proved, 
common-sense  is  generally  the  antithesis  of  custom.  Because  the 
manuals  laid  it  down  that  infantry  were  the  decisive  arm,  and 
because  officers  had  been  fed  on  the  manuals,  in  spite  of  the 
armoured  tank,  the  infantry  continued  from  September,  1916,  to 
November,  1917,  to  lead  the  assault.  Then,  on  November  20,  at 
the  battle  of  Cambrai,  tradition  received  such  a  blow  between 
the  eyes  that  even  the  most  pessimistic  asserted  that  the  tank  had 
at  length  come  into  its  own.  At  this  battle,  an  advance  of  10,000 
yards  was  made  in  twelve  hours  at  a  cost  of  6,000  casualties,  and 
8,000  Germans  and  100  guns  were  captured.  At  the  third  battle  of 
Ypres  a  similar  penetration  took  three  months  and  cost  over 

*  "  Die  Schlachten  im  Sommer,  1918,  an  der  West  Front,"  von  H.  Von  Zwehl, 
General  der  Infanterie  a  D. 

8* 


116  The  Reformation  of  War 

350,000  casualties.  The  traditional  school  was,  however, 
only  tank-shocked.  In  April,  1918,  the  Tank  Corps  was 
reduced  from  18  to  12  Battalions  because  infantry  reinforce- 
ments were  falling  short  !  On  July  4,  1918,  at  the  battle  of 
Hamel,  tanks  started  once  again  in  rear  of  the  infantry  !  The 
infantry  attack  was  on  the  point  of  petering  out  when  the  60 
tanks  co-operating  caught  up  the  leading  wave  of  Australians 
and  led  them  through  to  their  final  objective.  The  tank  crews 
suffered  no  fatal  casualties,  the  Australians  lost  672  in  killed  and 
wounded  and  1,500  Germans  were  captured.  Then  followed  the 
battles  of  Soissons,  July  18,  and  of  Amiens,  August  8,  and  the  tank 
became  the  terror  of  Germany.  On  July  1,  1916,  the  first  day  of 
the  battle  of  the  Somme,  the  British  Army  suffered  40,000  casual- 
ties ;  on  the  first  day  of  the  battle  of  Amiens  the  casualties  were 
slightly  under  1,000  ! 

During  July,  August,  September,  October  and  November, 
1916,  the  British  Army  lost  approximately  475,000  men,  it  cap- 
tured 30,000  prisoners  and  occupied  some  90  square  miles  of 
country.  During  the  same  months,  in  1917,  the  losses  were 
370,000,  the  prisoners  captured  were  25,000,  and  the  ground 
occupied  was  about  45  square  miles.  In  July,  August,  September, 
October  and  November,  1918,  the  losses  were  345,000,  the  prisoners 
captured  176,000,  and  the  ground  occupied  was  4,000  square  miles. 
If  now  we  divide  these  losses  by  the  number  of  square  miles  cap- 
tured, we  shall  obtain  a  rough  estimate  of  casualties  per  square 
mile  gained.     These  figures  are  approximately  as  follows  : 

(a)  July  to  November,  1916  : 

475,000-7-90  sq.  miles =5,277  casualties  per  sq.  mile. 

(b)  July  to  November,  1917  : 

370,000-7-45  sq.  miles =8,222  casualties  per  sq.  mile. 

(c)  July  to  November,  1918  : 

345,000-^-4,000  sq.  miles=86  casualties  per  sq.  mile. 

In  the  third  period  alone  were  tanks  used  efficiently. 
During  the  early  days  of  the  third  battle  of  Ypres,  in  1917,  it 
became  apparent  to  the  General  Staff  of  the  British  Tank  Corps 


The  First  Lap  of  the  Moral  Epoch        117 

that,  though  it  was  always  possible,  granted  the  ground  was 
passable,  to  break  an  enemy's  front  by  means  of  tanks,  by  tradi- 
tional methods  of  warfare  it  was  most  difficult  to  prevent  this 
broken  front  falling  back  on  its  reserves  or  to  prevent  the  reserves 
reinforcing  the  shattered  fragments.  A  project  was,  conse- 
quently, devised  to  overcome  this  difficulty.  It  consisted  in  the 
use  of  two  types  of  tanks,  one  type,  26  feet  long,  to  assault  the 
enemy's  front,  and  another  type,  30  feet  long,  to  move  right  through 
this  front  and  deposit  in  rear  of  it  a  chain  of  machine-gun  posts- 
Each  long  tank,  besides  its  crew,  was  to  carry  forward  within  it 
20  machine  gunners  with  4  machine  guns.  The  point  of  interest 
in  this  novel  form  of  attack  was  that  its  target  was  the  morally 
weakest  point  in  the  enemy's  battle  body,  namely,  his  rear. 

On  May  24,  1918,  the  General  Staff  of  the  Tank  Corps  made 
out  another  project,  which  carried  the  attack  on  the  enemy's  moral 
a  step  further. 

From  1 914  onwards,  traditional  warfare  had  sought  to  over- 
come the  enemy's  resistance  by  defeating  his  fighting  troops. 
Such  a  defeat  would  result  in  the  demoralization  of  his  command 
and  his  administrative  services.  The  demoralization  of  his 
command  would  react  on  the  will  of  the  enemy's  people,  who  might 
be  reduced  to  so  nervous  a  condition  that  they  would  either  over- 
throw their  government  or  force  it  to  sue  for  peace.  As  the  means 
of  this  method  of  warfare  were  superiority  of  weapon-power  and 
man-power,  that  is  brute  force,  and  as,  in  the  spring  of  191 8,  the 
Germans  were  numerically  superior  to  the  Allies,  there  appeared 
no  immediate  chance  of  winning  the  war  by  traditional  methods. 
Consequently,  it  was  considered  that  some  other  solution  should  be 
attempted.     The  proposals  made  were  as  follows  : 

The  strength  of  the  enemy's  fighting  forces  depended  on 
the  solidarity  of  their  organization,  which,  in  its  turn,  rested 
on  the  integrity  of  the  enemy's  command  and  system  of  supply. 
If  these  two  props  could  be  knocked  away,  then  the  whole  of 
the  battle  front  supported  by  them  would  collapse.  In  order 
to  effect  this  moral  debacle  of  the  enemy's  body,  the  Tank  Corps 


118  The  Reformation  of  War 

General   Staff    suggested    that,    for   the    1919   campaign,   two 
separate  forces  of  tanks  should  be  employed  : 

(i.)  A  force  of  fast  moving  machines  which,  under  cover  of 
darkness  or  smoke,  would,  at  top  speed,  rush  through  the 
enemy's  fighting  body  and,  making  for  all  Divisional,  Corps 
and  Army  Headquarters,  paralyse  these  brain  and  nerve 
centres  by  direct  attack ;  simultaneously,  other  fast 
machines  were  to  attack  all  railheads,  supply  and  signal 
centres,  and  reduce  the  personnel  at  these  points  to  a 
state  of  panic. 

(ii.)  A  force  of  slower  and  more  heavily  armoured  machines 
were  to  precede  the  attacking  infantry  and  assault  the 
enemy's  front  at  the  moment  the  faster  machines  were 
demoralizing  and  destroying  the  brains  and  stomach. 

It  was  considered  that  if  an  attack  of  this  nature  could 
be  delivered  on  a  frontage  of  from  80  to  160  kilometres,  such  a 
demoralizing  blow  would  be  delivered  that  the  greater  part 
of  the  German  front  in  France  would  crumble  and  produce 
such  a  condition  of  despair  within  Germany  that  the  Germans 
would  accept  defeat. 

The  operation  was  a  novel  one,  and  it  redounds  to  the  credit 
of  the  Imperial  General  Staff  in  London  that  they  accepted 
it  in  detail,  and  on  July  20,  1918,  communicated  it  to 
Marshal  Foch,  then  Generalissimo  of  the  Allied  Armies,  who 
agreed  "  in  every  way  with  the  main  principles  of  the  study." 
Consequently  this  plan  of  operations  was  accepted  as  the  basic 
tactical  idea  for  the  1919  campaign. 

Though  Fate  was  to  decide  that  this  attack  was  not  to  take 
place,  since  hostilities  terminated  in  November,  1918,  it  is 
nevertheless  interesting  to  note  the  following  evolution  :  that 
the  war  opened  with  traditional  warfare  ;  that  the  underlying 
idea    of  all    traditional   operations  is  killing ;   that  by  degrees 


The  First  Lap  of  the  Moral  Epoch        119 

this  idea  gave  way  to  that  of  demoralizing,  until,  finally,  a 
method  of  attack  was  devised  which  all  but  ignored  brute  force 
and  which  for  slaughter  substituted  nervous  shock,  aiming  a 
moral  blow  at  the  brain  in  place  of  a  physical  blow  at  the  body 
of  the  enemy's  army. 


VI 

THE   WEAPON   OF  THE   FUTURE 

IN  the  last  Chapter  I  showed  that  the  tactical  tendency 
in  modern  warfare  was  to  strike  at  the  moral  rather  than 
at  the  muscle  of  an  enemy ;  I  also  stated  that,  in  my  opinion, 
gas  would  prove  itself  to  be  the  weapon  which,  of  all  weapons, 
could  accomplish  this  blow  the  most  economically.  The  tank 
and  aeroplane,  be  it  well  remembered,  are  not  weapons,  but  only 
vehicles — means  of  carrying  weapons. 

In  this  present  Chapter  I  intend  examining  gas  as  a  weapon. 
First  of  all  it  should  be  realized  that  the  utility  of  gas  in  war 
is  not  a  new  idea.  In  modern  times,  this  idea  was  thought  of 
in  1812  and  again  during  the  Crimean  war  by  Lord  Dundonald. 
In  1864,  Mr.  B.  W.  Richardson,  considering  gas  warfare,  went 
so  far  as  to  write  : 

"  The  question  is,  shall  these  things  be  ?  I  do  not  see  that  humanity- 
should  revolt,  for  would  it  not  be  better  to  destroy  a  host  in  Regent's 
Park  by  making  the  men  fall  as  in  a  mystical  sleep,  than  to  let  down 
on  them  another  host  to  break  their  bones,  tear  their  limbs  asunder 
and  gouge  out  their  entrails  with  three-cornered  pikes ;  leaving 
a  vast  majority  undead  and  writhing  for  hours  in  torments  of  the 
damned  ?  "* 

In  1899,  the  employment  of  lethal  gas  as  a  weapon  was  dis- 
cussed at  the  Hague,  and  its  use  was  forbidden,  this  prohibition 
only  serving  to  give  Germany,  in  1915,  a  superior  weapon  to 
those  wielded  by  her  enemies.  Possessing  no  protection  against 
it,  the  British  and  French  troops  suffered  accordingly,  and 
anathematized  the  new  weapon,  not  only  because  it  was  new, 

*  Popular  Science  Review,   3.176.  (1864). 
120 


The  Weapon  of  the  Future  121 

but  because  it  was  extremely  powerful  and  Germany  held 
the  whip  hand  as  regards  its  production.  The  evil  name  then 
given  to  gas  has,  in  the  popular  imagination,  clung  to  it  ever 
since,  for  the  people  do  not  reason,  because  what  their  eyes 
have  read  their  lips  repeat.  With  the  populace  I  have  no  quarrel, 
for  they  are  docile,  thoughtless  creatures  depending  on  others 
for  their  ideas ;  but  with  people  like  Sir  Edward  Thorpe, 
President  of  the  British  Association  in  1921,  it  is  otherwise, 
for  they  at  least  are  presumed  to  be  intelligent.  Following 
in  the  footsteps  of  the  worthy  Baron  de  Jomini,  some  of  whose 
ideas  I  have  already  quoted,  Sir  Edward  has  pronounced  the 
use  of  lethal  gas  to  be  "  one  of  the  most  bestial  episodes  in  the 
history  of  the  Great  War.  .  .  .  Surely,"  he  exclaims,  "  comity 
among  nations  should  be  adequate  to  arrest  it  "  and  then, 
deviating  from  the  path  of  Jomini,  the  only  means  he  suggests 
is  to  leave  the  solution  of  this  problem  to  the  unfortunate 
League  of  Nations,  and  to  urge  all  scientists  to  set  their  face 
"  against  the  continued  degradation  of  science  in  .  .  .  augment- 
ing the  horrors  of  war  !  '  Gas  warfare  is  not,  as  Sir  Edward 
Thorpe  asserts,  "  the  very  negation  of  civilization,"  for  it  is, 
in  fact,  a  product  of  civilization  and  an  outcrop  of  science  which 
will  endure  ;    because,  as  Captain  Auld  says  : 

"  Chemical  Warfare  has  come  to  stay.  It  is  inconceivable  that 
the  light  barriers  of  mutual  consent  or  of  edict  can  effectively  close 
the  road  I  speak  of.  Military  history  and  human  nature  are  against 
it  at  every  turn.  No  case  is  known  of  a  successful  new  weapon  or 
a  tactical  advantage  having  been  discarded  once  its  value  was  ap- 
parent. No  agreement  or  treaty  has  proved  strong  enough  to  bind 
an  unscrupulous  enemy  seeking  an  advantage,  or  for  that  matter 
one  with  its  existence  at  stake.  To  avoid  the  new  road  is  to  risk 
being  passed  in  the  race  of  preparation  and  being  outflanked  and 
overwhelmed  in  the  event  of  hostilities. 

"  Whatever  we  do  in  the  matter  we  can  bind  no  one  but  ourselves. 
Until  war  ceases  we  must  be  prepared.  Apathy  is  suicidal.  Prejudice 
is  a  crime."* 

There  can  be  no  doubt,   outside  Bedlam,   of  the  wisdom 

*  "  Chemical  Warfare,"  by  Capt.  S.  J.  M.  Auld,  O.B.E.,  M.C.,  Royal  Engineers 
Journal,  Feb.,  1922. 


122  The  Reformation  of  War 

of  these  words,  just  as  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  decision 
of  the  Hague  Convention  presented  Germany,  a  country  un- 
scrupulous and  fighting  for  her  life,  with  a  means  wherewith, 
had  she  been  wise,  she  might  well  have  won  the  war.  Yet,  at 
the  Washington  Disarmament  Conference  of  1921,  at  which 
were  assembled  intelligent  human  beings,  what  do  we  find 
was  decided  ?     As  follows  : 

"  The  use  in  war  of  asphyxiating,  poisonous  or  other  gases,  and 
all  analogous  liquids,  materials  or  devices,  having  been  justly  con- 
demned by  the  general  opinion  of  the  civilized  world  and  a  pro- 
hibition of  such  use  having  been  declared  in  Treaties  to  which  a 
majority  of  the  civilized  Powers  are  parties, 

"  The  Signatory  Powers,  to  the  end  that  this  prohibition  shall 
be  universally  accepted  as  a  part  of  international  law  binding  alike 
the  conscience  and  practice  of  nations,  declare  their  assent  to  such 
prohibition,  agree  to  be  bound  thereby  as  between  themselves  and 
invite  all  other  civilized  nations  to  adhere  thereto." 

Then,  in  place  of  defining  what  is  meant  by  "  all  analogous 
liquids,  materials  or  devices,"  a  veritable  witches'  cauldron  of 
mysteries,    this   Conference,   in   the   footsteps   of   Sir   Edward 
Thorpe  and  others,  indulges  in  abuse.     The  Report  continues  : 

"  It  undertakes  further  to  denounce  the  use  of  poisonous  gases 
and  chemicals  in  war,  as  they  were  used  to  the  horror  of  all  civilization 
in  the  war  of  1914-1918. 

"  Cynics  have  said  that  in  the  stress  of  war  these  rules  will  be 
violated.  Cynics  are  always  near-sighted,  and  oft  and  usual  the 
decisive  facts  lie  beyond  the  range  of  their  vision." 

Before  I  examine  the  first  part  of  this  astonishing  agree- 
ment, I  will  examine  the  question  of  the  cynics : 

Giordano  Bruno  died  at  the  stake  because  he  was  a  cynic. 
Galileo  perished  in  prison  and  Copernicus  just  died  in  time 
to  escape  persecution  because  they  were  cynics.  Roger  Bacon, 
a  terrible  cynic,  hid  the  secret  of  gunpowder  in  a  cryptograph. 
Solomon  de  Caus  was  locked  up  in  a  madhouse  for  proclaiming 
that  ships  and  vehicles  could  be  moved  by  steam.  Simpson, 
who  first  made  use  of  chloroform  in  obstetrics,  was  considered 
an  agent  of  the  devil,  and  so  was  Jenner,  the  introducer  of  vaccina- 
tion against  smallpox.     George  Stephenson,  probably  the  greatest 


The  Weapon  of  the  Future  123 

of  all  cynics,  was  virtually  outlawed.  His  invention,  the  loco- 
motive, was  declared  to  be  "  contrary  to  the  law  of  God,"  be- 
cause "  it  would  prevent  cows  grazing,  hens  laying,  and  would 
cause  ladies  to  give  premature  birth  to  children  at  the  sight  of 
these  things  going  forward  at  the  rate  of  four  and  a  half  miles 
an  hour !  " 

With  reference  to  the  locomotive,  I  cannot  forbear  quoting 
from  the  Quarterly  Review  of  1825,  for  the  quotation  is  in 
character  so  traditional. 

"  What  can  be  more  palpably  absurd  and  ridiculous  than  the 
prospect  held  out  of  locomotives  travelling  twice  as  fast  as  stage 
coaches  !  We  should  as  soon  expect  the  people  of  Woolwich  to 
suffer  themselves  to  be  fired  off  upon  one  of  Congreve's  ricochet 
rockets  as  trust  themselves  to  the  mercy  of  such  a  machine  going 
at  such  a  rate.  We  will  back  old  Father  Thames  against  the  Woolwich 
Railway  for  any  sum.  We  trust  that  Parliament  will,  in  all  railways 
it  may  sanction,  limit  the  speed  to  eight  or  nine  miles  an  hour, 
which,  we  entirely  agree  with  Mr.  Sylvester,  is  as  great  as  can  be 
ventured  on  with  safety." 

Gunpowder,  the  most  revolutionary  military  discovery 
prior  to  that  of  gas,  was  anathematized  beyond  belief.  In  the 
Middle  Ages  wars  were  very  frequent,  because  weapons  were 
very  simple  and  unscientific.  Knights  boasted  of  their  courts 
and  codes  of  chivalry,  but,  when  battles  took  place,  there  was 
usually,  as  one  chronicler  puts  it,  "  a  horrid  slaughter  among 
the  common  folk."  The  reason  for  this  was  that  the  common 
folk  were  not  worth  taking  prisoners — they  had  little  in  their 
pockets.  Then  came  Roger  Bacon's  gunpowder,  and,  as  Carlyle 
says :  "  this  logic  even  the  Hyperborean  understands,"  for, 
"  it  makes  all  men  alike  tall.  .  .  .  Hereby,  at  last,  is  the 
Goliath  powerless  and  the  David  resistless  ;  savage  animalism 
is  nothing,  inventive  spiritualism  is  all."  Mind  has  in  fact 
triumphed  over  body,  and  upon  gunpowder  is  modern  democracy 
founded. 

Needless  to  say,  the  knight,  who,  dressed  in  steel  plate,  was 
immune  from  democratic  sticks  and  stones,  strongly  objected 
to  be  shot  by  a  poltroon,  that  is,  a  peasant   armed   with   an 


124  The  Reformation  of  War 

arquebus.  To  give  such  a  knave  power  over  the  knight  was 
an  insult  which  could  not  be  tolerated ;  it  was  utterly  barbarous, 
and  as  late  as  1626  we  find  a  certain  Mr.  Monro  writing  : 

"It  is  thought  that  the  invention  of  cannons  was  found  first  at 
Nuremberg  for  the  ruin  of  man  .  .  .  how  soone  the  trumpet  did 
sounde,  the  enemy  was  thundered  on,  first  with  those  as  with  showers 
of  hailstones,  so  that  the  enemies  were  cruelly  affrighted  with  them, 
men  of  valour  being  suddenly  taken  away,  who  before  were  wont 
to  fight  valiantly  and  long  with  the  sword  and  lance,  more  for  the 
honour  of  victory  ;  than  for  any  desire  of  shedding  of  blood  ;  but 
now,  men  are  marterysed  and  cut  downe,  at  more  than  half  a  mile 
of  distance,  by  these  furious  and  thundering  engines  of  great  cannon, 
that  sometimes  shoote  fiery  bullets  able  to  burn  whole  cities,  castles, 
houses  or  bridges,  where  they  chance  to  light,  and  if  they  happen 
to  light  within  walls,  or  amongst  a  briggad  of  foote  or  horse,  as  they 
did  at  Leipsigh,  in  the  grave  fon  Torne  his  briggad,  spoiled  a  number 
at  once,  as  doubtless  the  devilish  invention  did  within  Walestine, 
his  leaguer  at  this  time." 

Mr.  Monro  was  wrong,  because  gunpowder  humanized  sword 
and  lance  warfare.  The  cynic  of  1626  was  right,  and  so,  in  1922, 
will  the  cynic  once  again  prove  himself  right,  because  gas  will 
humanize  the  type  of  warfare  Monro  objected  to,  but  which  the 
members  of  the  Washington  Conference  wish  to  maintain.  Just 
as  William  Napier  objected  to  the  introduction  into  the  British 
Army  of  the  Minie  rifle,  a  weapon  with  a  range  of  one  thousand 
yards,  because,  as  he  said  with  some  heat,  "  it  would  turn  in- 
fantry into  long-range  assassins,"  so,  to-day,  do  we  find  many 
eminent  people  objecting  to  gas  warfare,  because,  being  a  novelty, 
its  meaning  is  only  sufficiently  understood  by  them  to  realize 
that  it  may  disturb  their  preconceived  ideas,  which,  through 
long  acquaintance,  have  become  cherished  personal  belongings. 

I  will  now  turn  back  to  the  compact  and  examine  the  peculiarly 
ambiguous  wording — "  other  gases  and  all  analogous  liquids, 
materials  or  devices."  What  do  these  words  mean  ?  They 
vaguely  and  all  embracingly  can  mean  nothing  outside  every- 
thing. In  fact  they  mean  that  no  chemical  whatever  may  be 
used  in  war.  This  is  absurd,  because  no  nation  can  accept  a 
decision  which  excludes  all  harmless  lachrymators  and  smokes 


The  Weapon  of  the  Future  125 

which  may  save  life,  as  well  as  high  explosives  which  give  off 
carbon  monoxide.  If  this  compact  be  carried  to  its  ultimate 
conclusion,  then  the  use  of  petrol  gas  in  military  motor  cars, 
and  of  coal  gas  in  officers'  billets,  are  also  forbidden  !  The  above 
words  exclude  and  debar  so  much  that  they  really  include  nothing, 
for  all  that  an  enemy  has  got  to  do,  in  peace  time,  is  to  prepare 
vast  quantities  of  various  gases,  for  he  knows  for  a  certainty, 
from  the  wording  of  this  compact,  that  innumerable  excuses 
will  always  be  found  on  the  battlefield,  such  as  the  use  by  his 
adversary  of  T.N.T.  or  picric  acid,  which  will  provide  him  with 
an  excuse  to  retaliate  with  the  real  "  stuff."  "  To  us,"  to  quote 
from  an  American  scientific  journal,  "  the  endeavour  to  abolish 
chemical  warfare  throughout  the  world  by  the  resolutions  of  the 
present  Conference  reminds  us  of  the  experience  of  King  Canute 
in  commanding  the  tides  not  to  rise."  Personally,  it  reminds 
me  of  that  "  cunning  "  bird  the  ostrich. 

I  will  now  inquire  into  the  military  reasons  why  I  believe  that 
gas  will  prove  itself  to  be  the  weapon  of  the  future. 

First  of  all  what  is  a  weapon  ?  A  weapon  is  a  means  of  im- 
posing by  force  a  policy  upon  an  adversary.  The  policy  of  a 
nation,  as  I  have  explained,  should  be  enforced  with  the  least 
loss  possible  to  either  side  and  to  the  world  at  large.  The  less 
this  loss  the  better  will  the  policy  enforced  flourish.  The  security 
of  peaceful  prosperity  is  the  object  of  war,  not  slaughter.  A 
weapon  should,  therefore,  possess  the  following  characteristics  : 

(i.)  Its  production  should  not  detrimentally  affect  prosperity. 

(ii.)  It  should  be  simple  to  manufacture  in  peace  or  war. 

(hi.)  Its  nature  should  be  unknown  to  the  enemy. 

(iv.)  It  should  economize  time  on  the  battlefield. 

(v.)  It  should  incapacitate  without  killing. 

(vi.)  It  should  permit  of  an  antidote  being  known  to  the 

side  using  it. 
(vii.)  It  should  effect  no  permanent  damage  to  property. 

The  weapons  of  traditional  warfare  do  not  permit  of  these 
characteristics  being  developed,  as  they  are  all  based  on  the  idea 


126  The  Reformation  of  War 

of  physical  and  material  destruction.  Gunpowder  revolutionized 
the  means  of  war  but  not  its  underlying  idea,  and  it  only  gave 
rise  to  the  use  of  more  powerful  weapons  of  the  killing  type  ; 
and  so  all  the  more  frightening  and,  consequently,  less  de- 
structive. I  will  now  show  that  gas  as  a  weapon  will  not  only 
effect  an  equally  great  revolution  of  means,  but  also  a  revolution 
in  idea. 

(i.)  Economy  in  Production.  Armies  and  navies  are  of 
necessity  expensive  organizations,  because  they  detract  in  place 
of  adding  to  peaceful  prosperity.  During  the  last  hundred  years 
they  have  become  more  and  more  costly  in  proportion  as  the 
means  used  by  them  have  diverged  from  the  civil  means.  At 
the  beginning  of  the  last  century  a  good  fowling-piece  differed 
little  from  the  musket  of  the  day,  and  a  merchantman  could 
rapidly  be  converted  into  a  ship  of  war.  To-day  the  rifle  and 
machine  gun  have  no  civil  uses  outside  Ireland,  and  a  super- 
Dreadnought  not  only  possesses  no  commercial  value,  but  detracts 
from  commercial  prosperity  by  costing  about  £8,000,000,  or 
considerably  more  than  the  whole  British  Navy  did  in  1823. 

Gas  is  an  article  of  commerce,  and  most  of  the  gases  employed 
during  the  Great  War  were  manufactured  not  only  by  the  normal 
commercial  processes  but  from  chemicals  in  everyday  use. 
Modern  civilization  could  scarcely  exist  if  such  chemicals  as 
chlorine,  phosgene  and  hydrocyanic  acid  were  removed.  Thou- 
sands of  tons  of  all  these  substances  are  yearly  made  use  of  for 
bleaching,  disinfecting,  dyeing  and  killing  rodent  and  insect 
pests.  Consequently,  we  see  that,  in  gases  and  war  chemicals, 
we  possess  not  only  a  means  of  securing  national  prosperity, 
but  also  a  means  of  fostering  it.  This  in  itself  constitutes  a 
stupendous  economic  revolution.  To-day,  Germany  possesses 
seventy  per  cent,  of  the  organic  chemical  output  of  the  entire 
world.  In  the  next  war  she  can  use,  if  she  so  will,  the  whole  of  her 
chemical  plant  for  the  production  of  warlike  chemicals.  Great 
Britain  possesses  but  eleven  per  cent,  of  the  world's  output.  What 
does  this  mean  ?  It  means  that,  in  spite  of  the  treaty  of 
Versailles,  which  limited   the   size   of   Germany's   army,  navy, 


The  Weapon  of  the  Future  127 

and  air  force,  Germany  still  possesses  gas  supremacy,  and,  of 
this  supremacy  in  1915,  Mr.  Balfour,  at  the  Washington  Con- 
ference, said  that,  "  the  result  had  been  very  near  to  a  complete 
disaster  for  the  allied  armies."  Should  not  we,  therefore,  do 
our  utmost  to  foster  organic  chemistry  at  home  ;  yet  how  can 
we  create  the  necessary  supply  unless  we  create  a  demand  for 
it.  If  gas  becomes  our  predominant  weapon,  then  a  demand 
for  it  will  be  created,  and  in  seeking  for  new  war  gases  we  shall 
undoubtedly  discover  chemicals  of  great  commercial  utility. 
"  The  Chemical  Warfare  Service,"  says  Mr.  R.  S.  McBride, 
"  furnishing  as  it  does  an  important  link  in  the  chain  of  chemical 
industries,  contributes  to  peace-time  welfare  of  the  community." 
This  alone  sufficiently  justifies  its  cost,  "  even  though  its  military 
value  as  a  measure  of  defence  were  entirely  ignored."* 

Compared  to  the  cost  of  the  means  employed  in  traditional 
warfare,  the  cost  of  war  chemicals  is  insignificant.  On  January 
16,  1922,  in  a  speech  before  the  Compressed  Gas  Manufacturers' 
Association,  New  York  City,  Brigadier-General  Amos  A.  Fries, 
chief  of  the  U.S.A.  Chemical  Warfare  Service,  said  : 

"  Chemical  Warfare  cost  the  United  States  in  the  World  War  just 
about  $150,000,000.  The  total  cost  of  that  war  to  the  United  States 
is  estimated  at  $30,000,000,000,  or  two  hundred  times  the  cost  of 
Chemical  Warfare,  and  yet  Chemical  Warfare  had  a  profound 
influence  in  causing  the  Germans  to  surrender.  Briefly,  Chemical 
Warfare  was  as  cheap  as  it  was  effective  and  humane.  If  the  United 
States  wants  economy  in  peace  while  at  the  same  time  being  prepared 
for  any  emergency,  gas  is  the  weapon  above  all  others." 

(ii.)  Simplicity  of  Manufacture.  Simplicity  of  manufacture 
of  weapons  during  war  time  is  frequently  a  synonym  of  victory. 
Men  are  generally  forthcoming,  but  unless  weapons  can  rapidly 
be  produced  in  bulk  these  men  are  useless,  and,  unless  the  nature 
of  the  weapons  made  is  simple,  bulk  production  will  not  be 
rapid.  During  the  recent  war,  the  training  of  the  British  New 
Armies  was  seriously  delayed  on  account  of  shortage  of  weapons, 
and  it  was  not  until  the  beginning  of  1918,  or  after  more  than 

*  "  Chemical  Warfare  and  the  Arms  Treaty,"  R.  S.  McBride,  Chemical  and 
Metallurgical  Engineering,  February  22,   1922. 


128  The  Reformation  of  War 

three  years'  strenuous  effort,  that  sufficient  shells  were  produced 
to  satisfy  the  demands  made.  If,  before  the  war,  we  had  devoted 
our  attention  to  war  gases,  it  is  quite  conceivable  that  we  might 
have  discovered  a  gas  against  which  the  Germans  would  have 
possessed  no  immediate  protection,  and  that,  by  firing  a  few 
thousand  projectiles  loaded  with  this  gas  from  the  existing 
field  guns,  we  should  have  attained  greater  results  than  we  did 
by  multiplying  high  explosive  shells  by  the  million  ;  which, 
in  their  turn,  demanded  thousands  of  extra  guns  and  gunners 
to  fire  them.  During  the  war,  we  multiplied  the  nature  of  our 
guns  and  so  complicated  training.  What  gas  enables  us  to  do  is 
to  use  the  same  gun  and  only  change  the  nature  of  the  chemical 
inside  the  shell,  which  scarcely,  if  at  all,  affects  the  training  of 
the  gunners.  Further  still,  gas  is,  what  may  be  called,  a  universal 
weapon ;  that  is  to  say,  "  in  the  mechanics  of  firing  chemical 
ammunition  there  is  no  difference  whatever  from  the  mechanics 
of  firing  high  explosives  or  shrapnel." 

For  any  weapon  to  be  manufactured  rapidly,  it  is  necessary 
to  have  its  components  at  hand.  If  a  country  cannot  produce 
these,  then  at  any  crisis  it  may  suffer  from  a  weapon-famine. 
What  is  the  main  source  of  chemical  warfare  ?  Coal — coal-tar 
and  oil,  from  which  also  most  of  the  medicines  and  dyes  of  the 
world  are  produced.  In  Great  Britain  we  possess  vast  resources 
of  coal ;  consequently,  for  chemical  warfare  supplies  we  are  not 
dependent  on  foreign  products.  Not  only  is  it  unnecessary  for 
us  to  obtain  from  abroad  our  raw  material  for  weapons,  but, 
in  place  of  spending  our  money  on  foreign  nitrates,  we  can  spend 
it  on  home-mined  coal.  Germany  is  also  a  great  coal  producing 
country  ;  if  in  another  war,  as  in  the  last,  she  loses  her  command 
of  the  sea,  is  it  humanly  likely  that  she  will  placidly  accept 
defeat  because  of  a  shortage  of  traditional  weapons  when  gigantic 
resources  for  the  production  of  chemical  weapons  are  actually 
but  a  few  yards  under  her  feet  ? 

(hi.)  Secrecy  of  Nature.  Secrecy  in  the  nature  of  weapons 
is  the  foundation  of  tactical  surprise,  and  surprise,  as  I  have 
shown,  is  the  most  economical  principle  whereon  to  build  grand 


The  Weapon  of  the  Future  129 

tactics.  In  war,  surprise  is  the  pivot  of  victory.  In  the  past, 
the  brute-force  theory  of  warfare  has  to  a  great  extent  been 
foisted  on  to  the  armies  and  navies  of  civilized  nations  on  account 
of  their  inability  to  keep  their  weapons  secret.  And,  when  they 
have  attempted  to  do  so,  as  in  the  case  of  the  French  mitrailleuse 
in  1870,  training  has  suffered  so  severely  that  on  the  battlefield 
the  weapons  have  proved  useless.  The  difficulty  has  been,  and 
still  is,  that  once  a  weapon  is  in  the  hand  of  the  soldier  its  char- 
acteristics soon  become  known  to  other  nations,  the  most  noted 
exception  to  this  being  the  recoil  system  of  the  French  75  mm. 
field  gun.  In  this  case,  however,  it  was  unnecessary  for 
the  soldier  to  examine  it,  yet  once  in  the  hands  of  the  soldier 
this  contrivance  might  easily  have  been  sold  to  a  foreign  country. 
It  is  not  practically  possible  to  keep  a  bullet  or  a  shell  secret. 
It  is,  however,  possible  to  keep  the  contents  of  a  shell  secret. 
A  new  explosive  may  be  discovered  and  may  be  kept  secret,  but 
in  effect  it  will  only  be  a  modification  of  existing  means  of  de- 
struction. A  new  gas  may,  however,  be  kept  an  absolute  secret, 
and,  what  is  equally  important,  its  antidote  may  be  kept  secret 
as  well.  During  peace  time,  let  us  suppose  that  a  gunner  is 
trained  to  fire  shells  filled  with  chlorine  gas  and  that  the  container 
of  his  respirator  possesses  the  necessary  antidotes  to  chlorine. 
On  mobilization  he  is  given  shell  X  and  he  changes  his  training 
respirator  for  one  possessing  substance  Y,  which  is  an  antidote 
to  X.  X  and  Y  are  absolute  secrets,  he  has  not  the  faintest 
idea  what  they  are,  and  yet  they  may  enable  him  to  defeat  his 
adversary  within  a  few  minutes  of  the  first  attack  being  launched. 
I  will  corroborate  this  self-evident  advantage  possessed  by 
chemical  weapons  by  again  quoting  from  Mr.  McBride. 

"  Gas  as  a  military  agency  can  be  developed  by  research  and 
its  manufacture  continued  in  secret  indefinitely,  if  any  nation  wishes, 
despite  any  number  of  international  agreements  to  the  contrary. 
In  this  respect  it  differs  fundamentally  from  battleships  and  forti- 
fications, which  cannot  be  so  secretly  constructed  and  preserved." 

(iv.)  Economy  of  Time.     The  activities  of  war,  even  more 
so  than  those  of  peace,  are  controlled  by  time,  for  in  war  speed 

9 


130  The  Reformation  of  War 

and  improvisation  are  predominant  conditions.  As  regards 
weapons,  time,  in  its  military  sense,  is  a  correlative  of  effect. 
Thus,  the  speed  of  fire,  such  as  is  possessed  by  the  machine  gun, 
would  be  useless  if  the  bullets  were  ineffective,  and  ineffective 
they  frequently  are  when  fired  against  an  earthwork,  or  a  tank, 
or  into  the  blue.  With  gas  the  actual  rate  of  fire  may  be  much 
slower  than  that  of  traditional  projectiles,  though  as  it  is  normally 
carried  within  these  projectiles,  it  is  the  same.  But,  if  volume  of 
fire  be  considered,  it  will  at  once  become  apparent  that  no  tradi- 
tional weapon  possesses  this  quality  to  the  extent  of  gas.  From 
a  rifle  ten  aimed  shots  can  be  fired  in  a  minute,  from  a  machine 
gun  six  hundred,  from  a  field  gun  twenty  shells,  and,  if  shrapnel, 
each  will  contain  365  bullets,  so  that  in  a  minute  7,300  bullets 
will  be  fired.  Gas  is,  however,  composed  of  chemical  molecules 
each  of  which  can  disable ;  consequently,  the  projectiles  of  a 
gas  bombardment  cannot  be  reckoned  by  thousands  per  minute 
but  by  thousands  of  trillions.  In  fact,  so  immense  a  number, 
that  it  is  not  even  necessary  to  know  the  position  of  the  target  ; 
all  that  is  necessary  is  to  know  in  what  area  it  is,  and  then  to 
inundate  this  area.  Unlike  a  bullet,  the  effect  of  gas  does  not 
cease  once  the  force  generated  to  propel  it  is  spent,  for,  while 
the  bullet  is  "  dead  "  the  gas  molecule  is  "  alive,"  and  may  remain 
alive  for  days  after  gas  has  been  projected.  If  the  reader  can 
imagine  a  machine  gun  which  can  fire  millions  of  bullets  a  second, 
each  bullet  drifting  on  after  the  force  of  the  original  discharge 
has  been  spent,  creeping  through  trees  and  houses,  wandering 
over  walls  and  into  shelters  and  dug-outs,  then  he  will  have  some 
idea  how  gas  can  be  used  to  economize  military  time. 

(v.)  Economy  of  Life.  I  have  already  repeatedly  accentuated 
the  fact  that,  in  modern  warfare,  the  object  is  to  enforce  a  policy 
and  not  to  kill  and  destroy.  I  realize  that,  in  all  probability,  for 
many  years  to  come  killing  will  be  an  unavoidable  attribute  of 
battle,  but  it  stands  to  reason  that,  if  killing  can  be  reduced,  war- 
fare will  become  more  economical  and  the  object  of  war  will  be 
the  better  attained.  I  have  already  examined  the  alleged  horrors 
of  gas  warfare  and  have  shown  definitely  that,  during  the  recent 


The  Weapon  of  the  Future  131 

war,  it  was  twelve  times  as  humane  as  traditional  warfare.  In 
my  opinion  it  can  be  made  more  humane  still  directly  the  idea  of 
killing  is  replaced  by  that  of  incapacitating.  A  bullet  is 
essentially  a  lethal  weapon,  for  it  is  impossible  to  design  a  non- 
lethal  bullet  which  would  be  of  any  practical  use  in  war.  It  is, 
however,  quite  as  feasible  to  employ  non-lethal  gases  as  lethal 
ones,  and  their  power  to  incapacitate  is  enormous.  During  the 
third  battle  of  Ypres,  General  Fries  states,  "  that  the  British  had 
over  160,000  gas  casualties,  but  only  4,000  deaths — 2\  per  cent." 
Whether  these  figures  are  correct  I  am  unable  to  say,  but,  as  a 
partaker  in  this  battle,  I  can  vouch  that  after  mud,  mustard  gas 
was  the  severest  resistant  encountered. 

On  the  three  days  preceding  the  attack,  on  March  21,  1918,  it 
is  estimated  that  the  Germans  fired  250,000  mustard-gas  shells 
against  the  British  Third  Army,  which  suffered  a  loss  of  500 
officer  casualties. 

' '  In  spite  of  the  fact  that  the  Germans  had  no  reserve  gas  for  many 
days  after  the  beginning  of  the  Argonne  fighting — the  greatest  battle 
in  American  history — the  gas  casualties  among  the  Americans, 
according  to  the  best  information,  amounted  to  27.2  per  cent,  of  all 
American  battle  casualties.  This  is  all  the  more  remarkable  when 
we  consider  that  about  one  half  of  all  American  battle  casualties 
occurred  in  the  battle  of  the  Argonne,  where  the  Germans  had 
practically  no  gas.  They  had  used  up  all  reserves  of  that  material 
against  the  British  and  the  French  earlier  in  the  season,  and  hence 
had  only  daily  production  to  draw  upon."* 

These  are  a  few  examples  of  the  direct  effect  of  gas  as  an  in- 
capacitating weapon  ;  I  will  now  examine  its  indirect  effect.  If 
soldiers,  in  order  to  protect  themselves  against  bullets,  had  to  don 
armour,  even  if  this  armour  could  be  made  proof,  the  bullet  would 
not  lose  its  whole  value,  for,  by  forcing  the  soldier  to  wear  armour, 
it  would  soon  reduce  him  to  a  state  of  physical  exhaustion.  In 
place  of  attacking  his  body  it  would  attack  his  mobility.  Gas, 
by  compelling  a  soldier  to  wear  a  respirator,  can  accomplish  this 
important  military  result.  "  Physical  vigour,"  writes  General 
Sibert  (Director  Chemical  Warfare  Service,  U.S.A.,  in  1919),  "  is 

*  Extract  from  United  States  War  Department  Annual  Report,  191 9. 


132  The  Reformation  of  War 

one  of  the  greatest  assets  in  any  army.  Gas,  used  properly  and 
in  quantities  that  will  be  easily  obtainable  in  future  wars,  will 
make  the  wearing  of  the  mask  a  continuous  affair  for  all  troops 
within  two  to  five  miles  of  the  front  line,  and  in  certain  places  for 
many  miles  beyond.  If  it  never  killed  a  man,  the  reduction  in 
physical  vigour  and,  therefore,  efficiency  of  an  army  forced  at  all 
times  to  wear  masks  would  amount  to  at  least  25  per  cent." 

If  the  statistics  of  the  total  casualties  of  the  Great  War,  so  far 
as  they  are  ascertainable,  are  examined,  it  will  be  found  that  by 
far  the  greatest  number  of  casualties  were  suffered  by  the  infantry, 
and  that  these  casualties  were  inflicted  by  infantry  weapons — 
bullets  fired  by  rifles  and  machine  guns.  It  follows,  consequently, 
that,  if  infantry  could  be  abolished,  warfare  would  be  made  much 
more  humane  and  economical  than  it  is  to-day,  and,  as  one  writer 
puts  it,  "  without  infantry,  the  ravages  of  war  would  be  reduced 
something  like  eighty  per  cent.,"  and  then  adds,  "  When  the  frock 
coats  get  about  the  long  table  and  begin  to  talk  about  limiting 
war's  barbarity,  they  want  to  realize  that  they  won't  do  much 
good  by  omitting  a  little  of  the  millinery  of  war.  What  the  world 
wants  them  to  do  is  to  keep  the  infantry  at  home."* 

Gas  will  accomplish  this  very  effectively,  as  I  will  now  show. 

An  infantry  soldier  cannot  go  into  action  in  a  diver's  suit  with 
a  mile  or  two  of  piping  played  out  from  a  spool  on  his  back,  yet 
so  powerful  are  certain  modern  gases,  such  as  Lewisite,  that  they 
will  penetrate  without  difficulty  all  ordinary  clothing  and  burn 
the  skin  beneath  it.  To  put  a  man  into  an  air-tight  suit  is  im- 
practicable, as  in  battle  he  will  die  of  heat  apoplexy.  Infantry,  as 
infantry,  can  play  but  a  small  part  in  gas  warfare,  and  with  their 
disappearance  can  war  be  humanized,  as  I  will  show  later  on. 

There  are  two  further  reasons  why  gas  warfare  will  economize 
life  by  reducing  casualties.  The  first  is  that,  as  I  have  explained, 
gas  is  a  universal  weapon,  it  can  be  used  by  all  arms  ;  conse- 
quently, the  result  will  be  what  I  will  call  a  universal  type  of 
casualty.  The  nature  of  all  wounds  wall  be  very  similar,  because 
the  means  of  inflicting  them  will  be  similar  ;  consequently,  medical 

*  Racine,  Wisconsin,  Call,  January  7,  1922. 


The  Weapon  of  the  Future  133 

arrangements  on  the  battlefield  can  be  simplified.  The  second  is 
that,  since  new  war  gases  can  be  kept  secret,  surprise  in  war  will 
become  more  frequent  and,  consequently,  the  winning  of  victories 
will  be  speeded  up.  The  shorter  the  war  the  less,  normally,  is  the 
loss  resulting. 

(vi.)  Assurance  of  an  Antidote.  In  traditional  warfare  the 
only  universal  antidote  to  being  killed  is  to  kill,  hence  its  bar- 
barous and  blood-thirsty  nature.  From  time  to  time  means  have 
been  sought  to  reduce  casualties — such  as  body  armour,  helmets, 
shields  and  entrenchments.  Gas  is,  however,  unlike  all  tradi- 
tional weapons  in  that,  if  a  new  gas  is  discovered,  immediately 
an  antidote  can  be  provided  for  it.  Consequently,  it  is  now 
possible  to  send  men  into  battle  equipped  with  weapons  against 
which  the  enemy  may  possess  no  protection,  while  our  own  men 
are  completely  protected.  This  in  itself  constitutes  such  a  colossal 
tactical  revolution  that  it  is  difficult  at  present  to  see  where  it 
will  lead.  In  my  own  opinion  it  will  sound  the  death-knell  of 
infantry  as  we  know  them  to-day,  and  how  this  will  be  accom- 
plished I  will  explain  in  a  future  Chapter.  One  fact  requires, 
however,  to  be  accentuated,  namely,  no  nation  can  hope  to  protect 
their  fighting  forces  effectively  against  gas  unless  offensive  gas 
warfare  is  studied  during  peace  time  and  the  troops  themselves 
trained  to  understand  what  this  form  of  warfare  entails. 

(vii.)  Economy  of  Property.  As  the  objective  in  war  is  to 
guarantee  and  safeguard  prosperhy,  destruction,  even  of  the 
enemy's  property,  should  be  avoided.  In  modern  warfare  the 
means  of  destruction  have  become  so  great  that  no  nation  con- 
siders its  frontiers  safe  unless  it  possesses  an  army  sufficiently 
powerful  to  destroy  the  enemy  before  the  enemy  can  destroy  it. 
The  horror  of  the  results  of  invasion  was  one  of  the  causes  not 
only  of  the  Great  War  but  of  the  armed  peace  which  preceded  its 
outbreak. 

The  war  of  1914-1918  was  a  war  of  high  explosives,  and  tradi- 
tional methods  of  destruction  were  carried  to  such  a  pitch  that 
entire  towns  were  demolished,  villages  completely  vanished,  not 
a  stone  remaining,  and  the  surface  of  hundreds  of  square  miles  of 


134  The  Reformation  of  War 

fields,  vineyards  and  orchards  was  literally  blown  away.  It  is 
incredible  that  anyone,  who  has  the  welfare  of  humanity  at  heart, 
can  wish  to  repeat  this  devastation.  Yet  it  cannot  be  avoided  as 
long  as  traditional  warfare  is  maintained.  Substitute  gas  warfare 
for  high  explosive  warfare  and  a  remedy  presents  itself ;  this  is 
what  the  short-sighted  cynic  wants,  but  the  professional  humani- 
tarian will  have  none  of  it.  Why  ?  Because  he  is  blinded  by 
tradition,  and  should  he  happen  to  be  a  politician,  he  is  unable  to 
forget  his  votes — truth  must  be  obscured  so  that  he  may  continue 
to  rule  the  blotting-paper  brained  multitudes. 

After  reading  through  what  I  have  already  written,  I  cannot 
conceive  how  any  rational  person  can  have  the  face  to  maintain 
that  traditional  warfare  is  more  economical  and  humane  than 
chemical  warfare.  I  can  understand  anyone  wishing  to  abolish 
war,  for  the  world  is  full  of  those  who  have  no  stomach  for  a  fight  ; 
but  I  cannot  understand  how  it  is  possible  for  people  judged  sane, 
people  who  have  lived  through  the  last  war,  even  if  at  a  safe  dis- 
tance, wishing  to  repeat  its  destruction.  This  they  are  doing  as 
long  as  they  prevent  armies  and  fleets  developing  on  scientific 
lines.  For  the  prosperity  of  the  world,  scientific  military  research 
is  essential.  "  Scientists  are  making,"  says  General  Hartley, 
"  very  rapid  advances,  and  many  of  these  will  have  a  direct  bearing 
on  the  next  war.  It  is  absolutely  essential  to  make  adequate 
provision  to  continue  research  on  gas  warfare  problems,  as  other- 
wise all  preparations  for  defence  may  prove  valueless.  .  .  .  Such 
research  can  only  be  made  effective  by  the  closest  sympathy  and 
co-operation  between  soldiers  and  scientists,  and  unless  their  co- 
operation is  much  closer  than  it  was  before  the  late  war,  there  will 
be  little  chance  of  success.  It  is  for  the  scientists  to  explore  the 
possibilities  and  to  develop  such  as  are  thought  likely  to  be  of 
value,  and  for  the  soldiers  to  apply  the  results  to  their  investiga- 
tion of  war  problems."* 

At  least  a  military  generation  will  have  to  pass  by  before  a 
stock  of  soldiers  is  bred  which  can  fulfil  their  part  in  this  contract, 

*  "  British  and  German  Gas  Warfare,"  Brig. -General  H.  Hartley,  C.B.E., 
M.C.,  The  Journal  of  the  Royal  Artillery,  February,  1920. 


The  Weapon  of  the  Future  135 

and  then  it  will  take  another  generation  of  soldiers  to  work  out 
scientifically  the  changes  which  traditional  tactics  must  undergo. 
Those  of  us  who  believe  in  the  inevitability  of  war  are  nevertheless 
apt  to  think,  as  great  wars  only  occur  at  about  fifty  year  intervals, 
that,  whatever  changes  science  may  demand,  we  have  ample  time 
to  rest  before  seriously  setting  to  work  to  discover  what  the  next 
great  war  will  require.  No  assumption  could  be  more  fallacious, 
for,  before  a  new  military  idea  is  accepted,  a  whole  school  of  obso- 
lete ideas,  religious  in  their  intolerance,  has  to  be  converted  to 
the  new  idea,  and  not  until  it  is  converted  will  efficient 
training  take  place,  and  training  is  an  all  essential  of  victory.  If 
the  truth  must  be  known,  should  the  next  great  war  explode 
in  1972,  then,  if  we  work  hard,  we  may  just  be  able  to  convert  the 
traditional  school  in  time  and  replace  it  by  a  school  of  military 
scientists.  Not  brawny  halberdiers  skilled  at  the  game  of  push 
of  pikes  or  push  of  bullets  or  push  of  shells,  bullets  and  shells 
which  strike  down  fool  and  sage  alike  ;  but  intelligent  thinkers 
who  will  push  their  ideas  to  the  detriment  of  the  enemy's  beef, 
who  will  pit  brain  against  muscle,  and,  if  opposed  by  muscle  alone, 
will  win  a  war  quite  possibly  in  a  night  without  a  day,  as  in  the 
next  Chapter  I  will  explain. 


VII 

THE  FUTURE  OF  AIR  WARFARE 

IN  the  last  Chapter  I  stated  that  gas  was  a  universal  weapon 
because  it  could  be  employed  by  all  types  of  arms.  In 
this  Chapter  and  the  two  following,  I  will  substantiate  this  state- 
ment by  showing  that  to-day  we  are  approaching  the  adoption 
of  a  universal  means  of  military  movement  which  will  more 
completely  than  ever  before  enable  the  universal  weapon  to 
be  employed. 

In  the  past,  the  motive  force  of  all  military  movement  on 
land  has  been  muscular  power,  and,  tactically,  this  was  the 
main  motive  energy  used  throughout  the  Great  War,  which, 
in  my  opinion,  will  definitely  close  a  military  epoch  stretch- 
ing from  the  cave  man  to  the  present  day.  This  muscular 
power  was  of  two  degrees — human  and  animal.  Tactically, 
the  soldier  is  simply  a  weapon  mounting  of  about  one-eighth 
h.p.  energy,  which  limits,  to  a  considerable  extent,  the  nature 
and  power  of  the  weapons  he  carries.  In  the  past,  in  order  to 
increase  the  speed  of  the  soldier  the  only  means  available  was 
to  mount  him  on  an  animal  of  greater  muscular  energy  than 
himself,  and  if,  when  so  mounted,  he  was  unable  to  carry  a 
certain  weapon,  this  weapon  was  either  carried  on  an  animal 
or  hauled  by  one  or  more  animals.  In  the  South  African  War 
we  see  as  many  as  thirty-two  oxen  harnessed  to  a  five-inch 
gun,  and  each  animal  requiring  fodder  added  enormously  to 
the  complexity  of  war. 

As  the  limitations  of  muscular  energy  in  their  turn  limited 
the  nature  and  power  of  weapons,  consequently  we  see,  especially 
in  modern  times,  the  introduction  of  a  great  variety  of  weapons, 
each  attempting  to  make  good  certain  deficiencies  in  the  others 

136 


The  Future  of  Air  Warfare  137 

due  to  the  deficiencies  in  their  mountings.  Thus,  for  example  : 
if  it  were  possible  for  an  infantryman  to  carry  a  machine  gun 
and  several  thousand  rounds  of  ammunition,  the  rifle  would 
long  ago  have  been  scrapped.  And,  again,  if  it  were  possible 
for  six  horses  to  haul  at  high  speed  a  six-inch  gun  and  one 
hundred  shells,  eighteen-pounder  field  guns  would  no  longer 
be  required.  But  such  changes  have  not  been  possible  because 
muscle  power  possesses  definite  limits. 

To-day,  we  possess  an  all  but  universal  means  of  movement 
— the  petrol  engine,  which  will  influence  land  weapons  as  it 
is  to-day  influencing  air  weapons,  and  as  steam  has  and  is 
influencing  naval  weapons.  At  sea,  in  capital  ships,  we 
see  a  tendency  towards  a  universal  weapon — the  big  shell ; 
and  in  auxiliary  craft  a  tendency  towards  a  universal  weapon — 
the  torpedo.  These  weapons  are  very  similar  in  nature,  though 
the  first  is  used  for  out-fighting  and  the  second  for  in-fighting, 
for  both  are  but  metal  containers  filled  with  high  explosives. 

In  the  air  there  is  a  greater  difference,  two  entirely  different 
weapons  being  used.  The  big  aeroplane  carries  the  bomb  and 
the  small  the  machine  gun.  In  the  future,  I  believe  that  these 
two  weapons  will  more  closely  coincide ;  this  I  will  discuss  pre- 
sently ;  meanwhile,  I  will  examine  the  most  universal  means  of 
movement  yet  devised,  namely,  the  aeroplane,  with  its  power 
of  movement  in  three  dimensions. 

Though  the  power  of  three  dimensional  movement  by  aircraft 
is  generally  recognized,  the  influence  of  this  power  on  the  future 
of  warfare  is  in  continual  dispute,  because,  so  I  believe,  we  have 
not  yet  learnt  to  think  of  war  from  its  third  dimensional  aspect. 

Hitherto  strategy,  or  the  art  of  moving  fighting  units — armies 
or  fleets — has  been  either  one  or  two  dimensional  in  nature. 
On  land,  the  major  strategical  movements  are  normally  one 
dimensional,  because  armies,  and  particularly  modern  armies, 
cannot  move  or  supply  themselves  rapidly  unless  movement 
is  directed  along  roads,  railways,  canals,  or  rivers.  These  con- 
stitute lines  of  advance,  each  line  possessing  two  directions, 
that  is  facility  to  move  forwards  or  backwards.     Where  these 


138  The  Reformation  of  War 

lines  do  not  exist,  the  nature  of  war  tends  towards  that  of  par- 
tisan operations ;  in  other  words,  wars  in  countries  devoid  of 
communications  are  tactically  small  wars,  however  large  the 
forces  employed  may  be.  At  sea,  naval  movements  are  in  nature 
two  dimensional,  because  the  vehicle  of  movement  is  an  area 
and  not  a  line ;  the  exception  to  this  rule  is  the  power  of  move- 
ment of  the  submarine,  which  I  will  discuss  in  Chapter  IX. 

Bearing  in  mind  these  three  dimensions  of  movement,  it 
will  at  once  be  recognized  that  the  future  strategical  problems 
of  war  are  closely  connected  with  the  protection  of  land  roads, 
sea  roads,  and  air  roads,  in  order  that  trade  may  prosper,  and, 
in  the  event  of  it  being  threatened,  may  be  secured  by  military 
force. 

As  the  powers  of  aircraft  include  the  dimensions  of  move- 
ment made  use  of  by  armies  and  fleets,  it  stands  to  reason  that, 
of  the  three  great  defence  forces  of  civilized  nations,  the  air 
force  is  the  only  one  which  can  closely  and  continually  co-operate 
with  the  other  two.  On  account  of  this  ability  to  co-operate, 
that  is  to  move  with  armies  or  navies  and  yet  independently 
of  them,  we  are  faced  by  the  following  portentous  strategical 
problem  :  may  not  this  power  of  aerial  co-operation  become 
so  perfect  that,  in  place  of  aircraft  co-operating  with  navies 
and  armies,  these  forces  will  instead  co-operate  with  aircraft, 
and  that  possibly,  at  some  date  in  the  future,  the  utility  of  armies 
and  navies  will  be  reduced  to  zero,  aircraft  entirely  replacing 
them  ?  I  will  shortly  examine  this  problem,  which  embraces 
the  following  three  sub-problems  : 

(i.)  The  influence  of  aircraft  on  land  warfare, 
(ii.)  The  influence  of  aircraft  on  sea  warfare, 
(hi.)  The  independent  action  of  aircraft  in  air  warfare. 

Before  examining  these  sub-problems,  it  is  necessary  to 
make  certain  of  the  tactical  limitations  of  aircraft,  for  this  will 
enable  us  to  consider  these  problems  logically. 

Aircraft  are  of  two  types— the  lighter  and  the  heavier  than  air 
machines.     I  am  of  opinion  that  the  main  purpose  of  the  airship 


The  Future  of  Air  Warfare  139 

in  future  warfare  will  be  the  carriage  of  supplies  rather  than  offen- 
sive action,  though  these  vessels  may  assist  this  action  by  long- 
range  reconnaissance.  The  airship  is  virtually  the  tramp 
steamer  of  the  air,  and  there  is  no  reason  why  vessels  should  not 
be  built  which  could  circumnavigate  the  globe,  or  carry  a  hundred 
tons  and  upwards  for  distances  ranging  over  thousands  of  miles. 
Compared  to  an  aeroplane,  the  airship  is  a  slow  moving  craft 
with  a  lower  ceiling  on  account  of  the  danger  of  rising  above 
the  hail  line  ;  it  is  conspicuous  even  at  high  altitudes,  readily 
picked  up  by  searchlights  and  easily  held  within  their  rays. 
It  is  easily  attackable  and  cannot  well  be  armoured,  it  requires 
a  numerous  personnel  to  maintain  it,  an  expensive  housing 
and  mooring  system,  and  it  is  a  gluttonous  consumer  of  gas. 
Its  one  predominant  characteristic  is  that  it  can  remain  motion- 
less in  the  air  without  the  expenditure  of  energy. 

The  chief  characteristic  of  the  aeroplane  is  speed  of  loco- 
motion in  three  dimensions.  This  speed  to-day  is  well  over 
150  miles  an  hour,  and,  when  diving,  300  miles  an  hour ; 
further  still,  many  aeroplanes  can  climb  at  1,000  feet  the 
minute.  When  in  movement,  an  aeroplane  can  proceed  straight 
from  point  to  point,  motion  in  the  air  encountering  no  physical 
obstruction  as  on  land  and  sea.  Its  predominant  limitation  is 
that  it  cannot  remain  motionless  in  the  air,  to  which  may  be 
added  that  the  ceiling  of  a  useful  war  machine  is  unlikely  to 
exceed  30,000  feet. 

From  the  above  we  may  deduce  the  elements  of  its  tactical 
nature — a  high  offensive  power  and  limited  means  of  direct 
protection,  that  is  protection  by  armour.  The  greater  its 
radius  of  action  the  less  offensive  it  becomes  on  account  of  petrol 
replacing  armament,  and  the  more  it  is  protected  by  armour 
the  less  will  be  its  range  of  action  on  account  of  steel  replacing 
petrol.  From  these  deductions,  I  will  extract  three  tactical 
requirements  which  later  on  I  shall  refer  to,  namely : 

(i.)  Aircraft   protection   is   to   be   sought   for   in   the   height 
they  can  operate  from  the  ground. 


140  The  Reformation  of  War 

(ii.)  Aircraft  offensive  power,  if  the  above  protection  is  to 
be  maintained,  depends  on  the  size  of  the  target. 

(iii.)  Aircraft  radius  of  action  depends  not  only  on  the  amount 
of  petrol,  etc.,  carried,  but  on  refilling  while  in  the  air. 

Bearing  in  mind  the  aeroplane's  three  dimensional  power 
of  movement  and  that  the  air  presents  to  it  no  physical  obstacle, 
the  size  of  an  air  force  is,  in  theory,  unlimited.  In  practice, 
however,  this  is  not  true,  for  as  aeroplanes  cannot  remain  motion- 
less in  the  air,  the  factor  which  limits  the  numbers  which  can 
usefully  be  employed  is  landing  ground,  which  is  more  and  more 
difficult  to  find  as  aeroplanes  increase  in  size. 

Besides  this  limitation,  the  following  are  of  secondary  im- 
portance :  it  becomes  readily  "  bogged "  in  a  ground  mist, 
sense  of  direction  is  frequently  lost  in  cloud  and  fog,  landing 
at  night  and  in  foggy  weather  on  unprepared  landing  grounds 
is  dangerous,  and  further,  though  an  aeroplane  is  not  tied  down 
to  definite  tracts  of  country,  as  wheeled  vehicles  are,  or  to 
definite  expanses  of  water,  as  ships  are,  it  is  to  a  very  consider- 
able extent  tied  down  to  its  landing  grounds.  In  the  Great 
War,  on  account  of  its  static  nature,  no  great  difficulty  was 
experienced  in  providing  these ;  nevertheless,  in  France  during 
the  last  eighteen  months  of  the  war,  the  average  wastage  in 
aeroplanes  was  between  fifty  and  eighty  per  cent,  per  month. 
Of  these  casualties  but  one  quarter  were  due  to  hostile  action, 
the  greater  number  resulting  from  crashes  on  landing.  Will 
crashes  in  future  be  less  frequent  ?  This  is  doubtful  in  spite  of 
improvements  to  be  expected.  Consequently,  as  belligerents 
may  have  to  replace  their  entire  equipment  of  machines  once 
every  two  months,  either  an  immense  number  of  reserve 
machines  will  have  to  be  maintained  during  peace  time,  or  co- 
operation with  the  slow  moving  land  forces  abandoned,  or  a 
plan  of  attack  evolved  which  will  decide  the  war  within  a  few 
weeks  or  days  or  hours  of  its  outbreak. 

I  will  now  turn  to  the  three  problems  of  this  Chapter  : 
The  Influence  of  Aircraft  on  Land  Warfare.—  At  present  we 


The  Future  of  Air  Warfare  141 

do  not  posses  a  tactical  theory  of  aerial  warfare.  Our  outlook 
during  the  recent  war,  and  to  a  very  great  extent  to-day,  was 
and  is  a  Homeric  one.  Hero  met  hero  in  hand-to-hand  fight, 
and  victories  were  based  on  individual  contests.  From  this 
primitive  type  of  warfare  we  must  expect  in  the  future  to  see 
evolve  an  elaborate  tactics,  for  in  the  next  great  war  capture 
of  the  air  will  become  of  supreme  importance,  because  of  all 
tactical  "  positions  "  the  air  is  the  one  which  commands  all  others. 
Once  this  supreme  point  of  vantage  is  gained,  the  next  tactical 
operation  will  be  to  deliver  an  aerial  attack  on  the  land  forces, 
not  only  on  their  bodies — their  men,  horses  and  guns,  but  on 
their  brains — their  command  headquarters  ;  on  their  nerves — 
their  system  of  communications  ;  on  their  internal  organs — 
their  bases,  supply  depots,  chemical  and  engineering  works 
and  workshops. 

The  ultra-traditional  school  does  not  hold  these  views ;  its 
adherents  possess  little  if  any  imagination,  and  what  was  good 
enough  for  the  army  and  navy  in  19 14  is  good  enough  for  these 
forces  to-day.  Such  is  the  opinion  which  they  hold,  in  spite 
of  the  fact  that  armies  and  navies  as  organized  and  equipped 
in  1914  did  not  win  the  war.  But  to  these  bats  blinded  by  light 
this  is  the  fault  of  the  war  and  not  of  the  19 14  organization. 
Their  ignorance  is  colossal  and  is  only  excelled  by  their  lack  of 
vision.  On  Armistice  Day,  19 18,  a  typical  adherent,  without 
a  smile  on  his  face,  said  to  me  :  "  Thank  God  !  we  can  now  get 
back  to  real  soldiering."  Aircraft  are  quite  useful  in  order  to 
assist  the  other  arms,  to  range  their  guns  and  to  fly  about  with 
cameras  and  bombs  ;  they  can  co-operate,  of  course  ;  but  act 
independently — never !  As  to  replacing  infantry  or  Dread- 
noughts— absurd  !  Such  are  the  views  held  by  the  older  and 
fruitier  traditional  vintage. 

The  new  and  raw  wine,  still  not  quite  fermented,  thinks 
otherwise.  It  realizes  that  the  aeroplane  is  a  new  means  of  waging 
war,  and  it  applies  it  to  the  old  end — killing  and  destruction. 
Consequently,  in  place  of  humanizing  war  and  so  rendering  it 
less  costly  and  wasteful,  these  thinkers  are  frequently  terrified 


142  The  Reformation  of  War 

by  their  own  thoughts.  What  do  they  see  ?  They  see  columns 
of  foot  and  horse  wending  their  way  towards  their  battle  area, 
whole  divisions  twelve  miles  long  toiling  along  dusty  roads. 
Then  they  see  in  the  distance  tiny  specks  on  the  horizon,  they 
grow  bigger,  there  is  a  droning  of  engines — twenty  low  flying 
armoured  battle  planes  top  the  rise  in  front,  and,  before  the 
wretched  infantry  have  time  to  unstrap  their  limbered  vehicles 
and  mount  their  machine  guns,  there  is  a  rattle  of  musketry 
from  twenty  times  twenty  machine  guns.  In  ten  minutes  the 
whole  column  is  traversed  from  van  to  rear,  250,000  bullets  have 
been  pumped  into  it — not  30,000,  as  on  the  Conegliano-Pordonone 
road — and  the  very  dust  of  the  highway  is  churned  into  a  porridge 
of  blood. 

Such  warfare  as  this  is  truly  horrible,  because  it  is  so  one- 
sided. To  shoot  down  infantry  in  this  manner  is  mere  massacre. 
But  such  slaughter  must  continue  so  long  as  infantry  exist  and 
so  long  as  tactics  are  controlled  by  the  traditional  school.  Further, 
this  school  believes  in  material  destruction.  In  the  aeroplane 
they  behold  a  means  of  accentuating  destruction  to  such  an  extent 
that  killing  in  bulk  will  become  unnecessary.  Here  at  least  we 
see  a  glimmer  of  light,  economic  destruction  replacing  the  killing" 
of  human  beings.     Of  this  type  of  attack  Mr.  Lanchester  writes  : 

"  Depots  of  every  kind  in  the  rear  of  the  enemy's  lines  would 
cease  to  exist ;  rolling  stock  and  mechanical  transport  would  be 
destroyed  ;  no  bridge  would  be  allowed  to  stand  for  24  hours  ;  railway 
junctions  would  be  subject  to  continuous  bombardment.  ...  In 
this  manner  a  virtually  impassable  zone  would  be  created  in  the  rear 
of  the  enemy's  defences,  a  zone  varying,  perhaps,  from  100  to  200 
miles  in  width  .  .  .  not  only  will  the  defence  be  slowly  strangled 
from  the  uncertainty  and  lack  of  supplies  of  all  kinds,  but  ultimately 
retreat  will  become  impossible.  The  defending  force  will  find  itself 
literally  in  a  state  of  siege  under  the  worst  possible  conditions.  .  .  . 
Thus,  in  the  extended  employment  of  aircraft,  we  have  the  means 
at  hand  of  compelling  a  bloodless  victory."* 

I  do  not  intend  to  waste  my  ink  in  proving  that  the  old 
vintage  is  wrong.     To  all  beings,  possessed  of  any  intelligence, 

*  "  Aircraft  in  Warfare,"  Lanchester,  pp.  187,  188. 


The  Future  of  Air  Warfare  143 

this  must  be  apparent.  Instead,  I  intend  showing  that  though 
the  new  wine  of  war  is  perfectly  right  in  asserting  that  aeroplanes 
can  destroy  infantry  like  vermin,  and  devastate  whole  districts, 
it  is  extremely  foolish  to  use  such  means  of  imposing  the  will  of 
one  nation  on  another,  when  non-lethal  gases  will  enable  this  same 
end  to  be  attained  with  incomparably  greater  economy  of  life 
and  property. 

Let  us  picture  to  ourselves  again  the  infantry  toiling  along 
the  road.  The  aeroplanes  approach  ;  they  do  not  skim  a  hundred 
feet  above  the  road,  but  fly  at  an  altitude  well  outside  effective 
bullet  range.  They  open  their  chemical  tanks  and  a  fine  spray 
and  fog  envelopes  the  astonished  column  of  men.  Suppose  that 
this  gas  is  a  deadly  poison,  all  these  men  will  shortly  die  ;  such 
an  end  is  anyhow  better  than  being  shot  to  pieces.  Suppose  this 
gas  is  a  vesicant  chemical,  like  mustard  gas,  all  these  men  will 
be  wounded  and  only  one  per  cent,  may  die.  Cruel  though  such 
an  attack  is,  it  is  incomparably  better  than  being  shot  to  pieces, 
and,  if  not  killed,  probably  maimed  for  life.  Suppose  that  this 
gas  is  but  an  anaesthetic,  then  the  whole  column  will  fall,  as 
Richardson  poetically  wrote  in  1864,  "  into  a  mystic  sleep," 
and  when  its  twenty  thousand  men  awake,  if  they  do  not  find 
themselves  prisoners,  they  will  have  anyhow  lost  several  good 
marching  hours.  What  general  on  earth  is  going  to  win  decisive 
battles,  battles  which  need  the  most  careful  assembly  and  speedy 
concentration  of  troops,  if  whole  divisions  and  army  corps  are 
going  to  be  put  to  bed  for  several  hours  at  a  time,  two  or  three 
times  a  day  ?  Consequently,  traditional  infantry,  the  greatest 
slaughterers  of  all,  have  no  place  on  the  future  battlefield,  not 
because  they  are  harmless  but  because  they  are  absurd  !  And 
with  them  must  depart  cavalry  and  all  horse-drawn  guns  and 
vehicles ;  in  fact,  the  whole  of  the  traditional  army  of  1914 
will  have  become  a  phantom. 

I  will  now  turn  to  Mr.  Lanchester's  picture.  Why  drive  the 
car  of  Juggernaut  over  entire  areas  ?  Why  destroy  depots, 
bridges,  railways  and  workshops  in  order  to  strangle,  bloodlessly 
though  it  may  be,  the  enemy's  troops  which  are  in  advance  of 


144  The  Reformation  of  War 

them  ?  Even  to-day  a  depot  drenched  with  a  sneezing  mixture 
would  cease  to  fulfil  its  duties,  and  a  mile  of  roadway  or  railway 
drenched  with  a  strong  lachrymator  would  become  impassable 
for  days  on  end.  More  impassable  than  if  the  road  were  smothered 
in  barbed  wire  or  the  rails  removed  from  the  permanent  way. 
Why  destroy,  when  no  one  really  wants  to  destroy  ?  When  I 
ask  Mr.  Jones  to  sign  an  agreement,  I  do  not  knife  him  if  he 
refuses,  for  if  I  do  so  he  may  die,  and  then  his  signature,  my 
objective,  will  be  unobtainable.  To  destroy  a  nation  is  to  destroy 
the  very  objective  of  peace  ;  consequently,  the  less  the  destruction 
the  more  complete  to  the  winner  is  the  victory. 

Some  time  back,  I  made  mention  of  three  tactical  require- 
ments, the  first  of  which  was  that  aircraft  protection  is  to  be 
sought  for  in  the  height  the  machines  can  operate  from  the  ground  ; 
and  the  second,  that  the  offensive  power  of  aeroplanes  depends 
to  a  great  extent  on  the  size  of  the  target.     I  will  now  examine 
the  relative  value  of  machine  guns,  bombs  and  gas   as   aircraft 
weapons.     For  a  machine    gun  to    be    effective    the    aeroplane 
must  fly  low,  which  means  that  it  must  forgo  its  natural  means 
of  protection  or  hamper  its  mobility  and  restrict  its  offensive 
power  by  carrying  armour.     For  a  bomb  to  be  effective  the  target 
must  be  sufficiently  large  to  be  hit  easily  ;  the  higher  the  aeroplane 
flies  the  smaller  does  the  target  appear  to  be.     Here  we  are  faced 
by  two  difficulties  which  would  seem  to  be  irreconcilable.     This 
is,  however,  not  so,  for  liquid  gas  sprayed  from  a  machine  or 
dropped  in  bombs,  which  burst  in  the  air  like  shrapnel,  will 
form  a  gas  cloud  which,  within  certain  limits  of  height,  increases 
in  size  in  direct  ratio  to  the  height  of  the  machines  from  which 
it  is  dropped  on  account  of  the  liquid  atomizing  as  it  falls  through 
the  air.     A  bullet  or  bomb  maintains  its  form  until  it  strikes 
the  target  or  the  ground  ;  gas  acts  otherwise,  its  form  increasing 
in  size  as  it  nears  the  ground  ;  consequently,  a  gas  attack  delivered 
from  a  height  against  a  small  target  is  likely  to  prove  a  much 
more  effective  attack  than  one  made  with  bullets  and  bombs. 
Again,  if  a  high  wind  is  blowing,  it  is  not  necessary  to  aim  at  the 
target,  but  in  place  to  manoeuvre  for  wind,  which  an  aeroplane 


The  Future  of  Air  Warfare  145 

can  always  do,  and  then  drop  the  gas  at  a  distance  from  the  target 
and  let  it  drift  over  it.  Yet  again,  suppose  that  the  traditional 
arms — infantry,  cavalry,  and  field  guns — are  strongly  protected 
by  anti-aircraft  artillery  and  machine  guns  and  the  attacking 
aeroplanes  are  afraid  to  approach  them,  all  that  these  machines 
need  do  is  to  fly  ahead  of  the  hostile  column  and  drench  sections 
of  the  road  it  is  marching  along,  preferably  defiles  and  road- 
junctions,  with  persistent  lethal  or  non-lethal  gasses,  which  will 
compel  the  traditional  arms  to  wear  their  respirators  continuously. 
What  will  their  rate  of  march  then  be,  seeing  that  the  infantry 
carry  fifty  to  sixty  pounds  of  arms  and  equipment  ? 

The  answer  is  :  at  best  two  or  three  miles  a  day,  for  marching 
in  respirators,  especially  in  hot  weather,  is  not  a  practical  military 
operation.     In  my  opinion,  the  fact  of  the  case  is  that  the 

TRADITIONAL    SOLDIER  IS   DOOMED. 

The  Influence  of  Aircraft  on  Sea  Warfare.  I  will  now 
turn  to  the  second  problem — the  influence  of  aircraft  on  sea 
warfare. 

I  have  already  accentuated  the  fact  that  the  main  theory 
of  all  past  naval  warfare  was  that  fighting  at  sea  is  a  two  dimen- 
sional operation.  However,  during  the  recent  war,  two  weapons 
possessing  three  dimensional  powers  came  into  use — the  submarine 
and  the  aeroplane  (or  seaplane).  The  first  caused  consternation, 
and  the  second  proved  a  useful  adjunct  for  purposes  of  recon- 
naissance and  observation,  but  the  combined  use  of  these  two 
weapons  was  not  understood.  Combined,  their  offensive  power 
may  well  prove  enormous. 

What  does  the  traditional  naval  attack  entail — slaughter  in 
an  accentuated  form.  On  land,  military  units  are  seldom  ex- 
terminated, at  sea  the  extermination  by  drowning  of  entire 
ship's  crews  is  the  rule  and  not  the  exception.  Off  Coronel, 
the  Monmouth  and  the  Good  Hope  went  down  with  the  loss  of 
all  hands,  and,  of  Admiral  von  Spee's  squadron,  very  few  were 
saved  from  the  icy  waters  of  the  South  Atlantic.  Of  all  forms 
of  warfare,  sea  fighting  is  the  most  prodigal  ;  in  ten  minutes 
a  ship,  costing  £8,000,000,  manned  by  1,250  sailors,  may  be  sent 

10 


146  The  Reformation  of  War 

to  the  bottom.     Destruction  by  maximums  is  what  the  naval 
mind  aims  at. 

Besides  a  new  vintage  of  soldiers,  there  is  growing  up  amongst 
us  to-day  a  new  school  of  sailors  ;  men  who,  though  they  are 
considering  the  new  means  of  naval  warfare,  are  still  obsessed 
by  the  old  idea — destruction.  They  picture  a  fleet  of  Super- 
Dreadnoughts  pursued  by  aeroplanes  like  bears  pursued  by 
bees.  High  above  they  swoop  and  whirl.  Thousands  of  small 
smoke  bombs  are  loosed  into  the  air,  they  whistle  downwards, 
strike  decks  and  sea,  and  a  minute  later  all  is  lost  in  an  immense 
cloud  of  rising  smoke.  A  veritable  volcanic  eruption  has  been 
projected  from  heaven.  Under  cover  of  this  cloud  and  the  loss 
of  fighting  efficiency  caused  by  every  sailor  having  to  wear  a 
respirator,  dive  down  torpedo  aircraft,  while  submarines  race  over 
the  surface  of  the  water  towards  their  prey.  Immense  explosions 
throw  into  the  air  great  columns  of  water,  and  vortices  of  smoke 
vibrate  upwards.  Little  by  little  the  smoke  clears.  Where  is  that 
proud  fleet  ?  It  is  gone  :  £100,000,000  worth  of  steel  is  swirling 
downwards  through  the  depths  below,  and  the  surface  of  the  sea 
is  dotted  with  thousands  of  human  forms  as  if  they  had  been 
shaken  out  of  some  giant  caster.  There  are  oaths  and  groans 
and  shrieks ;  then,  with  horrible  gurglings,  one  by  one  they 
vanish  to  join  their  ships :  there  is  silence  and  the  victory 
is  won ! 

What  a  senseless  waste  of  good  steel  and  better  human  life. 
What  an  inane  and  barbaric  attempt  to  gain  more  prosperous 
peace  terms  than  those  which  existed  before  the  outbreak  of 
hostilities.  Why  destroy,  why  not  capture  ?  Here  then  is  another 
picture. 

The  fleet  of  Dreadnoughts  is  steaming  in  line  ahead,  preceded 
by  a  cruiser  screen.  Then  again  do  the  aeroplanes  approach 
and  the  smoke  bombs  are  showered  down.  They  are  toxic, 
and  the  crews  are  killed  and  disabled,  but  the  ships  are  saved. 
They  are  vesicant,  and  the  decks  are  splashed  with  mustard  gas  ; 
the  ships  are  saved  and  the  crews  are  mostly  disabled.  They 
are  filled  with  a  colic -producing  chemical,  and,  as  the  submarines 


The  Future  of  Air  Warfare  147 

once  again  approach,  they  emit  immense  clouds  of  the  same 
irritant.  Respirators  are  adjusted,  but  the  chemical  penetrates 
them  as  cloud  after  cloud  sweeps  over  the  great  vessels.  Men 
groan,  they  are  doubled  up,  the  crews  are  demented,  gun  stations 
are  abandoned,  discipline  is  cast  to  the  winds,  there  is  panic 
and  pandemonium,  and  not  a  shell  or  a  torpedo  is  fired.  A  motor- 
boat  puts  out  from  a  submarine  and  skims  over  the  water  towards 
the  enemy's  flag  ship.  A  rope  ladder  is  fired  into  the  air,  it  whirls 
upwards  and  its  grapnels  become  engaged  with  the  bridge.  A 
man  in  a  mask  swarms  up  it,  to  the  bridge  he  goes  ;  the  commander- 
in-chief  is  squatting  in  a  corner  groaning  and  holding  the  pit 
of  his  stomach.  The  man  in  the  mask  says  :  "  Hoist  the  white 
flag,  or  the  whole  of  your  fleet  will  be  sunk  in  five  minutes  !  ' 
Up  goes  the  signal  of  surrender,  and  a  few  days  later  ^100,000,000 
worth  of  steel  rides  at  anchor  in  a  hostile  harbour,  and  thousands 
of  foreign  sailors  are  eating  biscuits  and  bully  behind  the  wire  of 
the  prisoners'  cages.  Not  a  ship  has  been  lost  or  damaged,  and 
the  casualties  have  been  under  five  per  cent.,  and  most  of  these 
were  caused  by  fright  and  panic. 

The  question  may  now  well  be  asked,  how  can  such  an  opera- 
tion be  carried  out  in  the  middle  of  the  Pacific  ?  The  answer  is  not 
a  difficult  one,  if  the  third  tactical  requirement  I  laid  down  is 
remembered,  namely,  that  the  radius  of  action  of  aircraft  depends 
on  refilling  with  petrol  while  in  the  air,  and  in  this  case,  also,  while 
on  the  water. 

Aircraft  carriers  can  proceed  anywhere  a  battleship  can  steam. 
They  will  form  the  sea  bases  of  the  air  attack,  but  they  possess 
this  disadvantage,  that  to  refill,  and  especially  during  battle, 
aeroplanes  will  be  forced  to  leave  their  protective  element — the 
heights  of  the  air,  and  descend  to  dangerous  altitudes,  and  even- 
tually to  the  still  more  dangerous  surface  of  the  sea.  Conse- 
quently, I  believe  that  airships  will  be  used  as  air  bases,  on  the 
envelopes  of  which  aeroplanes  can  alight  to  refill  and  refit  at  ease. 
In  the  future,  such  moving  bases  should  be  able  to  carry  a  hundred 
tons  or  more  of  supplies  and  could,  in  their  turn,  replenish  their 
stock  from  large  supply  submarines  which,  possessing  power  to 

10* 


148  The  Reformation  of  War 

submerge,  would  be  able,  without  great  danger,  to  proceed  un- 
escorted to  various  rendezvous  in  the  oceans  and  seas  in  the 
neighbourhood  of  the  theatre  of  war. 

The  Independent  Action  of  Aircraft.  Whether  I  have  solved 
the  two  preceding  problems  I  must  leave  it  to  the  reader  to 
judge.  I  have  purposely  avoided  detail,  and  have  merely 
elaborated  an  idea  which  I  believe  to  be  possible ;  yet,  never- 
theless, I  believe  both  the  above  problems  and  the  solutions  I 
have  outlined  to  be  subordinate  to  the  third  problem,  which  I 
will  now  examine. 

I  have,  earlier  in  this  present  Chapter,  hinted  at  the  possibility 
that,  in  the  future,  air  forces  may  replace  armies  and  navies. 
Actual  replacement  is,  in  my  opinion,  a  misconception  of  the 
objective  in  war.  Armies  and  navies  are  lethal  instruments  of 
security,  but  the  true  object,  as  I  have  frequently  stated,  is  not  to 
kill  soldiers  or  sink  ships,  but  to  change  a  policy  which  these 
soldiers  and  ships  are  protecting.  If,  in  the  event  of  war,  an  air 
force  can  change  this  policy  with  less  physical  destruction  than 
in  the  past  it  has  been  possible  to  attain  by  means  of  armies  and 
navies,  and  this  may  be  the  case,  then  the  air  force  will  not  absorb 
the  military  purpose  of  navies  and  armies,  which  in  nature  is 
tactical,  but  will  instead  establish  a  new  conception  of  war,  a 
conception  in  which  naval  and  military  forces  will  have  either  no 
place  at  all  or  one  which  is  subordinate  to  their  present  purpose, 
and  by  subordinate  I  mean  the  occupation  of  land  and  sea  after 
a  moral  victory  has  been  won  on  land  by  aircraft. 

This  problem  is  the  most  vital  military  problem  of  to-day,  for, 
if  my  supposition  be  correct,  not  only  will  our  present-day  armies 
and  navies  be  valueless  in  war,  but  the  immense  sums  of  money 
spent  on  them  during  peace-time  will  be  squandered. 

I  have  already  pointed  out  that  the  policy  of  a  nation  is 
founded  on  the  will  of  its  civil  inhabitants,  and  that  the  supreme 
military  power  of  aircraft  is  their  ability  "  to  hop  "  over  armies 
and  fleets  and  attack  what  is  in  rear  of  them.  Here  then  is  this 
vital  problem  in  brief  :  can  a  hostile  nation  be  forced  to  change 
its  will  by  means  of  an  independent  aerial  attack  ? 


The  Future  of  Air  Warfare  149 

That  such  an  attack  is  possible  was  visibly  demonstrated  to 
all  who  inhabited  Paris  and  London  during  the  Great  War.  At 
first,  being  in  nature  a  novelty,  it  was  dubbed  immoral.  Is  this 
assertion,  however,  true  ?  Only  so  far  as  all  warfare  may  be 
classed  as  immoral,  in  which  case  the  less  the  ethical  and  economic 
damage  done  during  a  war  the  more  moral  will  the  waging  of  it 
become.  This  leads  us  to  the  following  question  :  will  aerial  war- 
fare in  the  future,  should  it  supersede  land  warfare,  do  more  damage 
than  the  damage  resulting  from  land  warfare  as  to-day  conceived 
and  accepted  ?  I  believe  that  it  may,  if  the  object  is  to  obliterate 
towns  and  cities  by  means  of  high  explosive  bombs.  I  believe 
that  it  will  not,  if  the  nerves  of  the  people  are  attacked  by  an 
offensive  directed  against  their  bodies  by  means  of  non-lethal 
gases.  I  have  shown  that  the  statistics  of  the  gas  casualties 
suffered  by  the  American  Army  during  the  Great  War  prove  that 
gas  warfare,  including  the  use  of  deadly  gases  such  as  chlorine  and 
phosgene,  is  twelve  times  as  humane  as  bullet  and  shell  warfare. 
Further,  I  have  pointed  out  that  the  general  assertion  that  gas 
warfare  is  immoral  is  founded  on  the  fact  that  nations  have  not  yet 
realized  that  great  wars  are  national  wars  in  which  the  attack  on 
the  will  of  the  so-called  non-combatants  is  the  objective.  Further, 
I  believe  that  the  civilian  will  fight  this  idea  to  the  death,  because 
it  is  far  more  comfortable  to  raise  forces  of  men  called  soldiers  and 
let  them  slaughter  each  other,  not  always  to  the  disadvantage  of 
the  civilian,  in  place  of  the  civilian  being  attacked  directly.  In 
the  past  such  attacks  have  been  difficult  to  deliver  because  warfare 
was  two  dimensional  in  nature,  and  where  armies  moved  (on  a 
plane  surface,  the  crust  of  the  earth)  other  armies  met  them  and 
blocked  their  way.  This  condition  still  holds  good  for  armies  and 
navies  but  not  for  air  forces,  and  as  the  object  of  war  is  to  attack 
the  will  of  the  enemy's  people,  and  as  aircraft  possess  the  ability  to 
avoid  armies  and  navies,  is  an  air  force  going  to  be  so  foolish  as  to 
attack  these  forces  in  place  of  attacking  this  will  ?  Whatever  the 
civilian  may  desire  or  squeak  for,  to  put  it  vulgarly,  in  the  next 
great  war  he  is  going  to  be  "  in  the  soup,"  and  what  kind  of  soup 
will  it  be  ?     A  pretty  hot  one  ! 


150  The  Reformation  of  War 

I  have  pointed  out  in  a  former  Chapter  that  destruction  can  be 
avoided  by  the  use  of  non-lethal  gases,  and  that  the  "  political  " 
danger  of  such  chemicals  is  that  they  can  incapacitate  and  terro- 
rize without  killing.  I  believe  that,  in  future  warfare,  great  cities, 
such  as  London,  will  be  attacked  from  the  air,  and  that  a  fleet  of 
500  aeroplanes  each  carrying  500  ten-pound  bombs  of,  let  us  sup- 
pose, mustard  gas,  might  cause  200,000  minor  casualties  and  throw 
the  whole  city  into  panic  within  half  an  hour  of  their  arrival. 
Picture,  if  you  can,  what  the  result  will  be  :  London  for  several 
days  will  be  one  vast  raving  Bedlam,  the  hospitals  will  be  stormed, 
traffic  will  cease,  the  homeless  will  shriek  for  help,  the  city  will  be 
in  pandemonium.  What  of  the  government  at  Westminster  ? 
It  will  be  swept  away  by  an  avalanche  of  terror.  Then  will  the 
enemy  dictate  his  terms,  which  will  be  grasped  at  like  a  straw  by  a 
drowning  man.  Thus  may  a  war  be  won  in  forty-eight  hours  and 
the  losses  of  the  winning  side  may  be  actually  nil ! 

If  a  future  war  can  be  won  at  the  cost  of  two  or  three  thousand 
of  the  enemy's  men,  women  and  children  killed,  in  place  of  over 
1,000,000  men  and  incidentally  several  thousands  of  women  and 
children,  as  was  the  case  in  France  during  the  recent  war,*  surely 
an  aerial  attack  is  a  more  humane  method  than  the  existing 
traditional  type.  Further,  the  material  damage  done  will  be 
insignificant  when  compared  to  the  damage  effected  during  the 
recent  war,  the  cost  of  which  can  only  approximately  be  reckoned 
in  thousands  of  millions  sterling. 

Here  then  is  the  moral  of  this  Chapter  : 

In  the  future,  when  once  the  storm  clouds  of  war  burst,  a 
nation  dare  not  depend  on  gaining  time  wherein  to  make  good  its 
deficiencies  in  preparation.  In  place  it  must  be  ready  to  act,  and 
act  at  once.  The  only  arm  which  can  so  act,  which  can  mobilize 
and  fight  within  twenty-four  hours  of  an  outrage  taking  place,  is 
an  air  force.     This  liberty  of  immediate  action  is,  in  fact,  its 

*  The  total  soldiers,  sailors  and  airmen  killed  during  the  Great  War  has  been 
estimated  at  between  nine  and  ten  millions.  The  loss  among  the  civil  popula- 
tions, excluding  Russia  since  the  close  of  1918,  due  to  killed,  diseases  directly 
attributable  to  the  war,  and  fall  in  birth-rate,  has  been  estimated  at  twenty 
millions. 


The  Future  of  Air  Warfare  151 

supreme  duty,  and,  however  important  co-operation  with  the  navy 
and  army  may  be,  first  and  foremost  must  an  air  force  be  prepared 
to  act  alone.  The  morality  of  such  action  is  beyond  question,  for 
self-preservation  is  a  human  right.  To  commit  felo-de-se  by 
denying  to  an  air  force  power  of  retaliating  against  the  will  of  the 
enemy,  is  the  act  of  a  nation  which  has  become  insane. 


VIII 


THE   FUTURE   OF  LAND   WARFARE 

THE  recoil  of  a  fire  arm  is  in  proportion  to  the  force  of  the 
explosion  of  its  charge,  and,  before  buffer  springs  were 
fitted  to  cannon,  this  recoil  was  detrimental  to  a  high  rate  of  fire. 
Human  ingenuity  overcame  this  difficulty,  not  by  restricting  the 
recoil,  by  bolting  the  gun  down  to  a  fixed  mounting,  but  by 
utilizing  the  force  of  the  recoil  to  reload  the  piece.  The  result  of 
this  wonderful  economy  of  energy  was  to  increase  the  rate  of  fire 
of  a  field  gun  from  about  five  rounds  to  30  a  minute  and  to  enable 
a  machine  gun  to  deliver  sixty  times  the  aimed  fire  of  a  breech- 
loading  rifle. 

Like  a  weapon,  every  human  activity  possesses  its  recoil, 
which,  as  it  grows,  by  degrees  transmutes  the  original  force  into 
something  new.  This  novelty,  in  its  turn,  possesses  its  recoil,  so 
the  process  continues,  progress  moving  along  its  predestined  path 
impelled  forward  by  the  force  engendered  through  the  friction  and 
integration  of  opposites. 

In  the  last  Chapter  I  peeped  beneath  the  veil  of  future  war  in 
the  air,  and,  as  I  fathomed  its  mysteries,  I  beheld  that  traditional 
armies  and  fleets  were  of  things  doomed,  for  I  saw  that  their  sand 
was  running  out  and  that  soon  they  must  take  their  place  in  the 
Valhalla  of  war.  Will  they  be  followed  by  other  soldiers  and 
other  ships  ?  I  think  so  ;  for,  potent  though  the  aeroplane  is,  it 
can  never  become  perfect,  for  perfection  does  not  exist  on  earth. 
In  its  day  it  will  be  eaten  up  by  its  own  recoil  and  its  powers 
digested  into  something  new. 

My  ignorance,  I  hope,  is  not  so  invincible  that  I  dare  to  guess 
at  what  the  nature  of  this  novelty  will  be.     All  I  intend  to  do  is 

152 


The  Future  of  Land  Warfare  153 

to  examine  the  recoil  of  aircraft  and  then  attempt  to  point  out  its 
direction. 

What  is  its  nature  ?  This  question  demands  another  :  how 
can  we  frustrate  the  powers  of  the  aeroplane  ?  We  can  secure 
ourselves  from  them  by  going  to  earth  like  foxes,  but  this  will  not 
master  them.  We  can  build  up  a  superior  air  force  and  destroy 
our  enemy's  air  fleet ;  this  is  a  common-sense  action,  but  it  is  one 
based  on  brute  force  and  is,  consequently,  uneconomical.  We 
may  discover  its  weaknesses — its  lack  of  power,  and  by  using  our 
brains,  our  human  cunning,  accentuate  these  weaknesses  until  they 
grow  into  defects  so  large  that  they  out -balance  its  powers. 

To  understand  these  defects,  even  if  only  to  see  them,  we  must 
impartially  dissect  and  analyse  the  powers  of  its  prey — the  tradi- 
tional arms,  for  it  is  their  defects  which  accentuate  the  power  of 
aircraft.  This  I  have  done  sufficiently  in  the  last  Chapter  in 
order  to  render  it  unnecessary  to  consider  this  subject  in  much 
detail. 

In  the  last  Chapter,  I  pointed  out  that  the  three  great  tactical 
requirements  of  aircraft  were  (i.)  for  protection — height  of  flight  ; 
(ii.)  for  offensive  power — size  of  target,  and  (iii.)  for  mobility — ■ 
rapidity  of  supply.  I  explained  how  the  use  of  gas  as  a  weapon 
enabled  the  aeroplane  to  equate  the  first  two  and  how  airships 
might  be  used  as  mobile  aerodromes.  I  also  pointed  out  that  the 
paramount  limitation  of  the  aeroplane  was  that  it  could  not  re- 
main in  the  air  without  the  expenditure  of  energy.  This  limita- 
tion is  the  Achilles'  heel  of  air  warfare.  Gravity  is,  in  fact,  the 
tactical  recoil  of  the  machine. 

For  the  aeroplane,  what  are  the  main  joints  in  the  harness  of 
present  -day  armies  ?  They  are  the  enormous  targets  they  offer  ; 
the  vulnerability  of  men  and  horses  to  bullets  and  gas  ;  the  slow- 
ness of  their  movement  and  the  dependence  of  their  supplies  on 
roads,  rivers,  railways  and  canals — fixed  communications  which 
from  the  air  can  be  followed  at  ease. 

What  have  we  got  to  do  ?  We  must  reduce  the  target,  that 
is,  make  it  so  small  that  the  aeroplane  is  forced  to  fly  at  low  alti- 
tudes in  order  to  discover  it.      But,  say  you,  it  need  not  do  so, 


154  The  Reformation  of  War 

because  gas  is  an  area  and  not  a  target  hitter.  Well  then,  we 
must  completely  protect  our  land  forces  against  this  weapon  and 
compel  the  aeroplane  to  risk  flying  at  low  altitudes,  which  will 
demand  the  replacement  of  gas  by  bullets.  Consequently,  we 
must  protect  our  troops  from  bullets  as  well.  Further,  we  must 
enormously  increase  the  speed  of  our  troops.  For  example,  let 
us  picture  to  ourselves  the  power  of  the  British  Army  had  it  been 
able,  in  August  1914,  to  march  in  one  night  from  Boulogne  to  the 
forest  of  Crecy,  a  distance  of  50  miles  ;  lay  hidden  there  ;  marched 
on  the  next  night  to  the  forest  of  Mormal,  100  miles  away ;  lay 
hidden  there  ;  marched  the  following  night  to  the  woods  in  the 
vicinity  of  Waterloo,  75  miles,  and  then,  like  a  tiger,  have  sprung 
on  von  Kluck  and  von  Biilow  as  they  advanced  westwards  from 
Liege.  But,  granted  that  by  some  magic  power  this  army  had 
been  supplied  with  seven-league  boots,  the  roads  and  railways 
would  never  have  permitted  of  even  100,000  men  and  their  im- 
pedimenta moving  at  this  rate.  Very  well  then,  in  place  of  crying 
"  Kamerad  !  "  we  must  scrap  roads  and  railways,  the  traditional 
means  of  movement,  and  move  over  areas,  that  is  straight  across 
country  like  ships  over  the  sea. 

Studious  reader,  are  these  problems  impossible  ?  Far  from 
it,  for  the  tank,  and  especially  the  tank  of  the  future,  solves  them 
all! 

(i.)  It  reduces  the  target,  for  it  does  away  with  great  march 
columns  and  immense  battle  formations. 

(ii.)  It  can  be  made  gas-tight,  so  completely  that  even  un- 
known gases  will  lose  their  dread. 

(hi.)  It  can  be  made  bullet-proof,  even  against  bullets  of 
enormously  enhanced  powers  to  existing  ones. 

(iv.)  It  can  be  made  to  move  at  20  miles  and  more  the  hour  or 
200  miles  the  day  for  several  days  without  refilling. 

(v.)  It  can  move  across  country,  and,  consequently,  free  itself 
from  the  dominion  of  roads  and  railways. 

It,  in  my  opinion,  is  the  product  of  the  recoil,  for  it  can,  by 
being  made  gas-tight,  force  the  aeroplane  to  fly  low  and  to  use 


The  Future  of  Land  Warfare  155 

bullets.  Then  the  tank  will  reply  with  bullets  and  the  aeroplane 
will  armour  itself  against  them.  Then  the  bullets  will  grow  bigger 
and  the  aeroplane  armour  thicker,  and  as  the  tank  on  the  ground 
is  less  affected  by  gravity  than  the  aeroplane  in  the  air,  the  tank 
will  attack,  not  so  much  its  powers,  but  its  preponderating  limita- 
tion— its  weakness,  and  in  spite  of  Professor  Einstein,  the  tank 
will  win  ! 

It  may  be  argued  here  that,  should  the  aeroplane  be  unable  to 
incapacitate  the  tank  crew  by  means  of  gas,  it  will  make  use  of  a 
gas  which  will  prevent  the  tank  engine  from  firing,  but  just  as  its 
crew  can  live  on  oxygen  or  compressed  air,  when  their  machine  is 
rendered  gas-tight,  so  may  the  energy  required  to  move  it  be  stored 
in  accumulators  which  temporarily  will  do  away  with  the  necessity 
of  combustion.  Again,  may  it  be  asserted,  if  the  aeroplane  be 
forced,  on  account  of  the  thickness  of  the  tank's  armour,  to  replace 
machine  guns  by  cannon,  that  is  volume  fire  by  fire  which  requires 
precision,  why  should  not  the  high  explosive  bomb  be  used,  for  it 
would  not  require  a  very  large  one  to  destroy  a  machine  protected 
by  armour  of  even  two  inches  in  thickness.  In  other  words,  why 
should  not  a  tank  be  attacked  in  the  same  manner  as  I  have  shown 
a  battleship  may  be  attacked  ?  This  is  not  impossible,  but  the 
difficulties  are  considerable.  First  of  all,  I  agree  that  though  20 
torpedo  carrying  aeroplanes  may  be  able,  under  cover  of  smoke, 
to  sink  a  Dreadnought,  it  should  nevertheless  be  remembered  that 
a  battleship  offers  vastly  greater  hitting  area  than  a  tank.  Again, 
it  must  not  be  overlooked  that  the  offensive  value  of  a  weapon 
is  correlated  to  its  cost.  Thus,  a  Super-Dreadnought  costs 
£8,000,000,  and  a  torpedo  carrying  aeroplane  about  £3,000 ; 
consequently,  the  cost  of  one  Super-Dreadnought  equals  the  cost 
of  2,700  torpedo  carrying  aeroplanes.  To  risk,  therefore,  20  or 
even  200  of  these  machines  in  the  destruction  of  one  Super- 
Dreadnought  is  an  economical  operation.  Not  only  is  a  tank  a 
much  smaller  target  to  hit  than  a  Super-Dreadnought,  but  its 
cost  should  not  exceed  £6,000,  or  the  cost  of  two  torpedo  carrying 
aeroplanes.  Would  two  be  sufficient  for  its  destruction,  seeing 
that  a  tank  can  so  completely  cover  itself  with  smoke  that  the  two 


156  The  Reformation  of  War 

aeroplanes  would  have  to  descend  within  a  few  feet  of  the  ground 
in  order  to  aim  their  bombs,  and,  while  diving  into  the  smoke  to 
nose  for  their  prey,  would  be  met  by  an  upwards  spray  of  large 
calibre  bullets  or  possibly  small  calibre  gas  shells,  which  would 
penetrate  an  inch  of  armour  at  500  to  1,000  feet  range  ?  If  two 
aeroplanes  be  insufficient,  the  addition  of  others  at  once  renders 
the  attack  uneconomical ;  that  is  to  say  :  if  it  costs  more  to  destroy 
a  tank  by  aeroplanes  than  the  tank  is  worth,  for  equal  sums  of 
money  more  tanks  than  aeroplanes  can  be  built  ;  consequently, 
with  the  increase  in  the  production  of  tanks  is  decreased  the  net 
value  of  aeroplanes  as  a  means  of  destroying  them.  Finally  it 
may  be  asserted  that  one  aeroplane  dropping  a  shower  of  medium- 
sized  bombs  will  be  sufficient  to  destroy  the  tank.  This  assertion 
has,  however,  no  foundation  in  past  experience.  In  the  recent 
war  no  single  tank  was  ever  hit  by  an  aeroplane  bomb.  But,  say 
you,  aeroplane  bombing  was  still  in  its  infancy.  I  agree,  but 
must  add  that  so  was  the  tank.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  in  1918,  the 
aeroplane  was  15  years  old  and  the  tank  only  two.  For  one  aero- 
plane, carrying,  let  us  suppose,  20  anti-tank  bombs,  to  hit  a  tank 
moving  at  20  if  not  30  miles  the  hour  under  a  pall  of  smoke,  would 
appear  to  me  to  be  almost  as  difficult  as  to  attempt,  in  a  London 
fog,  to  hit  a  snipe  with  buckshot. 

Having  now  dealt,  at  some  length,  with  the  influence  of  the 
tank  on  the  aeroplane  through  the  power  it  possesses  to  hit  at 
that  Achilles'  heel  of  the  air — gravity, I  will  turn  from  the  aeroplane 
to  the  traditional  arms  of  to-day  and  examine  the  influence  the 
tank  will  exert  on  their  transformation. 

From  what  has  gone  before,  it  may  seem  unnecessary  to  do 
this,  for,  if  it  be  accepted,  as  it  certainly  is  not  by  the  traditional 
school,  that  in  the  future  aeroplanes  are  likely  with  impunity  to 
destroy  infantry,  cavalry  and  gunners,  and,  in  all  probability,  will 
only  be  able  to  destroy  tanks  with  great  difficulty,  it  would  appear 
to  be  a  common-sense  action  to  replace  the  traditional  arms  by 
tanks.  Of  course  it  would  be  a  common-sense  action,  but,  of  all 
reasons,  this  is  the  last  one  which  will  persuade  the  traditional 
school  to  accept  it,  since  their  theory  of  war  is  not  founded  on 


The  Future  of  Land  Warfare  157 

common-sense  but  on  custom,  or  the  imitation  of  actions,  the 
utility  of  which  is  long  dead  and  buried  and  gone  to  dust.  I  will, 
therefore,  in  order  to  supply  the  reader  with  the  ammunition  of 
argument,  consider  the  power  of  tanks  against  the  traditional 
arms,  and  the  restriction  of  their  power  when  attached  to  them. 
I  will  now  show  that  the  tank  of  the  near  future  is  likely  to  be 
as  superior  to  the  traditional  arms  as  a  modern  destroyer  is  to  a 
British  coracle,  and  that  to  link  the  traditional  arms  to  tanks 
will  be  as  uneconomical  as  linking  sailing  frigates  to  a  squadron  of 
battle  cruisers. 

In  Chapter  V.,  I  briefly  outlined  the  general  influence  of  tanks 
on  the  tactics  of  the  Great  War,  that  is  on  traditional  fighting,  and, 
in  spite  of  the  fact  that  soldiers  are  still  found  who  believe  that 
the  tank  was  merely  a  war  freak,*  I  will  assume  that  the  reader  is  a 
sane  civilian  who  will  not  fall  into  a  frenzy  if  I  assume  that  tanks 
will  play  an  important  part  in  future  wars.  I  will  lay  down, 
therefore,  the  following  assumption  :  at  some  future  date  two 
armies  meet  in  battle,  each  possesses  infantry,  cavalry  and  artillery 
as  equipped  to-day  and  two  types  of  tanks — a  light  cavalry  tank 
possessing  a  speed  of  25  miles  the  hour,  and  a  heavily-armoured 
infantry  tank  with  a  speed  of  15  miles  the  hour.  What  will 
happen  ? 

I  will  assume  forthwith,  if  the  lessons  of  the  recent  war  are  of 
any  value,  and  if  human  nature  remain  what  it  is,  that,  by  the 
time  the  two  armies  are  within  striking  distance,  the  infantry  will 
be  in  rear  of  the  tanks  and  the  artillery  in  rear  of  the  infantry. 
Tank  will,  consequently,  engage  tank,  and  a  battle  for  tank  supre- 
macy will  result.  As  cavalry  cannot  take  part  in  this  battle, 
unless  it  be  employed  in  galloping  towards  the  hostile  machines 
and  scattering  land  mines  in  their  path,  an  operation  which  might 
more  efficiently  be  carried  out  by  a  mine-laying  tank  or  by  an 
aeroplane,  the  cavalry  tanks  will  be  detached  from  the  arm  they 

*  "  Possibilities  of  the  Next  War,"  Major-General  Sir  Louis  C.  Jackson, 
K.B.E.,  C.B.,  C.M.G.  (R.U.S.I.  Journal,  vol.  lxv.,  February,  1920)  :  "The  tank 
proper  was  a  freak.  The  circumstances  which  called  it  into  existence  were 
exceptional  and  are  not  likely  to  recur.  If  they  do  they  can  be  dealt  with  by 
other  means  "  (p.  74).     These  other  means  are  not  mentioned  !     What  are  they  ? 


158  The  Reformation  of  War 

are  protecting  and  will  manoeuvre  behind  the  infantry  tanks  ready 
to  move  forward  should  the  enemy's  tank  front  be  pierced,  or 
preparatory  to  attacking  this  front  in  flank. 

The  question  now  arises,  what  can  the  infantry  do  ?  These 
troops  can  do  nothing  outside  playing  the  part  of  interested 
spectators.  What  can  the  gunners  do  ?  They  can  do  next  to 
nothing,  for,  being  distant  from  the  field  of  action,  upon  which  in 
a  minute  a  tank  may  have  changed  its  position  by  a  quarter  of  a 
mile,  they  dare  not  promiscuously  bombard  any  area  ;  besides, 
in  order  to  fire  at  all,  they  will  generally  have  to  employ  direct 
laying,  which,  in  most  cases,  will  require  them  to  be  either  with, 
or  in  advance  of,  the  infantry.  In  such  positions,  as  the  gunners, 
in  order  to  protect  themselves,  cannot  lie  flat  like  infantry,  their 
pieces  will  soon  be  silenced  by  hostile  machine  gun  fire. 

I  will  now  carry  the  battle  to  its  next  stage.  One  side  will 
gain  tank  supremacy  and  the  shattered  remnants  of  the  other 
side  will  retire.  As  the  pursuit  will  be  rapid — at  from  ten  to 
twenty  miles  the  hour — the  defeated  tanks  can  either  retire  with 
their  infantry,  which  delaying  them  will  jeopardize  their  retreat, 
or  else  abandon  their  infantry  and  let  them  be  destroyed.  Falling 
back  on  their  artillery,  what  can  the  gunners  do  ?  They  cannot 
move  their  guns  without  their  horses,  which  are  very  vulnerable 
to  fire,  and  they  cannot  fire  them  while  in  movement.  They  must 
therefore,  remain  stationary  and,  if  the  ground  in  front  of  the 
guns  be  an  obstacle  to  tank  movement,  they  may  possibly  hold 
up  the  enemy's  infantry  machines,  which,  nevertheless,  if  they 
advance  behind  a  smoke  cloud,  will  be  very  difficult  targets  to  hit. 
Meanwhile,  the  enemy's  cavalry  tanks  will  be  racing  round  the 
artillery  flanks  in  order  to  attack  in  rear  the  guns,  wagon  parks, 
teams  and  command  headquarters.  We  see,  therefore,  that,  even 
if  the  artillery  can  halt  the  hostile  infantry  machines,  in  nine 
cases  out  of  ten  the  guns  are  likely  to  be  destroyed  in  a  few  hours. 
The  only  arm  which  will  be  able  to  save  itself  from  destruction  is 
the  cavalry,  not  by  charging  the  enemy,  but  by  galloping  off  the 
field. 

In  the  main  this  picture  is  not  overdrawn,  because  to-day 


The  Future  of  Land  Warfare  159 

tanks  exist  which  can  move  at  twenty-five  miles  an  hour.  True, 
they  are  not  reliable — neither  was  the  motor-car  in  1901,  nor  the 
aeroplane  in  1909 — yet  the  tank  to-day  is  as  old  as  these  two 
means  of  movement  were  twenty-two  and  fourteen  years  ago  ; 
consequently,  there  is  no  reason  why  reliability  should  not  be 
accomplished  within  a  few  years  of  to-day.  Are  existing  cavalry, 
artillery  and  infantry  then  doomed  to  extinction  ?  Yes,  and 
certainly  as  regards  the  former  two,  their  death  will  be  followed 
by  their  resurrection.     I  will  examine  this  assertion. 

No  operation  in  war  can  have  been  more  terrible  and  awe- 
inspiring  than  that  of  a  massed  cavalry  charge — a  blare  of  trum- 
pets, the  thunder  of  hoofs,  and  the  flash  of  steel.  When  such 
operations  were  possible,  only  the  steadiest  infantry  could  with- 
stand the  assault,  and  even  the  best  troops,  once  they  had  been 
pounded  by  shot  and  shell,  frequently  succumbed  to  the  cavalry 
charge.  Of  all  operations  in  war  it  was  the  most  rapid  and  the 
most  effective,  for  though  its  killing  power  was  seldom  as  great 
as  that  of  infantry,  its  disorganizing  and  demoralizing  power 
was  terrific. 

During  the  recent  war,  any  side  which  could  have  made  use 
of  its  cavalry,  as  Alexander  or  Frederick  the  Great  did,  would 
have  shortened  the  war  by  years,  and  this,  I  believe,  the  future 
will  prove,  for  so  essential  to  land  war  is  the  cavalry  charge  that 
it  must  be  reinstated  ;  besides,  the  problem  is  so  simple.  Picture 
a  brigade  of  tanks  moving  at  thirty  miles  an  hour  charging 
through  an  infantry  division.  What  can  the  infantry  do  ?  What 
can  the  gunners  do  ?  A  few  tanks  will  be  destroyed,  but  this  is 
all.  As  long  as  cavalry  depend  on  the  horse,  the  charge  is  dead  ; 
only  can  it  be  revived  by  replacing  the  horse  by  the  tank  ;  then, 
against  an  unarmoured  enemy,  the  result  is  certain. 

But  has  not  present-day  cavalry  still  a  part  to  play  in  the 
initial  and  final  stages  of  battle — reconnaissance  and  the  pursuit  ? 
None,  if  economy  of  time  is  of  any  value  in  war.  A  light  scout 
tank,  with  a  maximum  speed  of  thirty  miles  an  hour  and  a  mean 
speed  of  fifteen  miles,  can  easily  travel  one  hundred  and  fifty  miles 
in  a  day";  with  a  few  exceptions,  such  as  narrow  mountain  tracks 


160  The  Reformation  of  War 

and  very  thick  woods,  a  machine  of  this  nature  can  pass  over  all 
ground  negotiable  by  a  horse  and  can  traverse  many  obstacles 
which  a  horse  cannot  look  at.  It  can  lie  up  hidden  for  days  if 
needs  be  without  consuming  petrol ;  it  can  carry  its  own  supplies 
for  a  long  period,  and  its  crew  have  little  to  fear  from  hostile 
cavalry  or  francs-tireurs.  It  possesses  so  many  advantages  over 
the  horse,  and  so  few  disadvantages,  that  its  adoption  for  purposes 
of  reconnaissance  is  as  near  a  certainty  as  can  be  predicted. 

There  are  two  types  of  pursuit ;  the  first  against  a  retiring 
enemy,  the  second  against  a  routed  foe.  Against  the  first 
cavalry  can  do  no  more  than  annoy  ;  against  the  second  their 
use  is  great,  because  they  can  move  at  three  or  four  times  the 
pace  of  infantry  in  flight.  Tanks  will  move,  however,  at  twice 
the  pace  of  cavalry  and  will  carry  their  own  protection  ;  further, 
at  night-time,  under  the  rays  of  their  searchlights,  they  will  be 
able  to  carry  on  the  chase.  Onwards  they  will  go,  rousing  hostile 
bivouacs  by  the  shrieks  of  their  sirens,  flashing  their  search- 
lights along  hedgerows,  over  fields  and  through  villages  ;  they 
will  reduce  the  enemy  to  a  demented  mob.  Thus  will  they  destroy 
his  moral,  and  his  soldiers  will  cease  to  be  fighting  men.  Cavalry 
can  do  all  this  and  more,  if  they  will  exchange  flesh  for  steel. 
The  idea  is  the  same,  the  means  of  movement  is  alone  different. 

I  will  now  turn  to  artillery.  A  fortress  is  merely  an  artillery 
emplacement.  If,  in  the  past,  it  had  been  possible  to  move 
fortresses  in  open  warfare,  this  would  have  been  done.  In 
fact,  inihe  days  of  Alexander  and  Caesar  it  was  done,  for  fortresses 
were  made  of  wood,  and  could  be  moved  slowly  over  the  ground 
by  means  of  rollers.  To-day  this  is  no  longer  practical  since 
reinforced  concrete  has  replaced  wood.  Yet,  in  its  very  nature, 
the  tank  is  a  mobile  strong  point,  a  moving  bullet-proof  box 
in  which  is  mounted  a  gun. 

A  field  gun,  in  the  open,  can  be  attacked  by  bullet,  shell, 
gas,  or  bomb,  and  during  such  attacks  it  can  seldom  move. 
Because  of  the  vulnerability  of  artillery  to  bullets,  the  normal 
position  of  the  guns  is  in  rear  of  the  infant^,  and  if  not  so  pro- 
tected, then  must  an  escort  be  provided  ;   that  is  to  say,  infantry 


The  Future  of  Land  Warfare  161 

and  cavalry  must  be  immobilized  in  order  to  secure  the  gun 
against  infantry  and  cavalry  attack.  If  the  guns  are  attacked 
by  tanks,  this  escort  is  useless  ;  if  attacked  from  the  air  the 
gunners  and  their  teams  will  probably  suffer  heavy  casualties  ; 
further,  no  certain  protection  can  be  provided  against  gas.  All 
these  difficulties  can  be  more  than  overcome  by  mounting  the 
field  gun  in  a  tank. 

Let  us  picture  to  ourselves  the  following  weapon.  A  tank 
which  can  move  at  least  fifteen  miles  an  hour,  and  which,  when 
necessary,  can  be  rendered  gas-proof.  In  it  is  mounted  a  field 
gun,  an  anti-aircraft  machine  gun,  and  two  ordinary  machine 
guns.  What  can  such  a  weapon  do  ?  It  can  move  at  twice 
the  speed  of  a  horse-drawn  gun,  it  can  operate  behind  infantry, 
with  infantry,  in  front  of  infantry,  or  on  the  flanks  of  infantry. 
It  can  render  itself  gas-tight,  can  defy  all  aeroplane  bullets,  can 
attack  aeroplanes,  and  can  hide  itself  from  them  by  means  of 
smoke.  It  can  change  its  position  when  attacked,  can  fire  while 
in  movement,  and  does  not  require  an  escort.  It  has  nothing  to 
fear  from  infantry,  nothing  from  cavalry,  little  from  a  horse-drawn 
field  gun,  and,  if  attacked  by  fast  moving  tanks,  it  has  at  least  a 
chance  of  escape.  It  is  in  fact  a  movable  fortress,  which, 
if  rendered  floatable,  may  virtually  become  a  small  man-of-war. 
If,  in  the  next  war,  the  gunner  wishes  to  pull  his  weight,  then  he 
also  must  get  into  a  tank. 

I  will  now  turn  to  the  last  of  the  arms  of  traditional  armies 
namely,  the  infantry.  First  of  all,  it  should  be  realized  that, 
even  though  infantry  may  still  be  "  the  queen  of  battles,"  for 
eight  hundred  years  during  the  Christian  era  foot  troops  were 
mere  pawns  in  the  game.  When  the  armoured  knight  ruled  the 
battlefield,  infantry  was  employed  merely  to  garrison  castles, 
or  to  hold  tactical  points  such  as  swamps,  forests  and  hill-tops, 
that  is,  in  localities  in  which  the  knights  could  not  move.  I 
believe  that  the  armoured  tank  is  going  to  create  a  tactical 
condition  similar  to  that  created  in  the  past  by  these  armoured 
horsemen,  and  that,  in  the  near  future,  infantry,  if  they  exist, 
will  only  continue  to  do  so  as  police  and  the  defenders  of  positions 

ii 


162  The  Reformation  of  War 

— rail-heads,  bridge-heads,  workshops  and  supply  magazines. 
As  this  is  a  point  which  is  likely  to  be  hotly  debated,  I  will  trace 
the  evolution  of  this  assumption. 

To  provide  infantry  with  an  escort  of  tanks  detached  from  the 
main  force  of  these  machines  is  no  guarantee  that,  in  battle, 
should  the  tank  versus  tank  engagement  be  likely  to  fail,  any 
but  a  totally  incapable  commander  will  not  at  once  withdraw 
all  these  protective  machines  in  order  to  support  his  tanks,  for 
on  their  success  will  depend  victory  or  defeat.  Assuming  that 
there  will  be  a  capable  commander,  his  initiative  can,  of  course, 
be  restricted  by  supplying  him  with  protective  tanks  the  speed 
of  which  does  not  exceed  the  pace  of  infantry.  Such  a  restriction 
is,  however,  absurd  ;  it  not  only  violates  the  principle  of  the 
offensive,  but  these  slow  machines  will  be  no  match  against  the 
faster  hostile  ones. 

Another  solution  must  be  tried.  The  infantry  may  be 
equipped  with  a  heavy  machine  gun,  which  will  weigh  seven  times 
the  weight  of  a  rifle,  and,  therefore,  an  infantryman  will  not  be 
able  to  carry  it.  It  will  have  to  be  mounted  on  a  transporter, 
and,  as  off  this  machine  it  will  be  immobile  and  on  it  unprotected, 
the  first  thing  its  crew  will  ask  for  is  protection  by  armour.  We 
are  once  again  back  to  the  tank,  and  an  indifferent  one  at  that, 
for  the  effective  range  of  the  tank  gun  against  a  lightly  armoured 
tank  is  far  greater  than  that  of  a  heavy  machine  gun  against 
a  heavily  armoured  machine.  In  addition  to  this  objection, 
there  is  nothing  to  prevent  the  heavier  tank  being  equipped 
with  a  heavy  machine  gun  as  its  in-fighting  weapon. 

As  it  would  appear  that  the  heavy  machine  gun  will  not 
fulfil  the  purpose  for  which  it  is  intended,  it  would  seem  pre- 
ferable to  give  infantry  a  high  velocity  gun  such  as  the  tank 
six-pounder.  If  this  be  done,  the  evolution  will  be  the  same  as  in 
the  case  of  the  heavy  machine  gun.  Starting  on  its  wheels,  it 
will  end  in  a  small  six-pounder  tank,  and,  if  it  be  found  to  be  an 
efficient  tank  destroyer,  then  the  proper  place  for  it  is  in  the  tank 
battle  and  not  behind  it. 

I  consider  that  the  main  deduction  to  be  made  from  the 


The  Future  of  Land  Warfare  163 

above  is  that,  whatever  offensive  weapon  is  given  to  the  infantry, 
it  will  have  first  to  be  motorized  ;  secondly,  armoured  ;  and 
thirdly,  will  be  taken  away  from  these  troops  at  all  critical  periods 
— periods  when  it  is  most  required  by  them.  If  this  be  a  correct 
judgment,  then  we  must  seek  for  a  solution  of  this  problem  in 
a  purely  defensive  weapon,  that  is  to  say  a  weapon  which  cannot 
be  used  when  in  movement.  Such  a  weapon  is  the  land-mine, 
which,  to  hark  back  to  mediaeval  warfare,  will  take  the  place 
of  the  old-fashioned  moat.  It  may,  therefore,  be  predicted  that 
tank  mine-layers  will  accompany  future  infantry,  siege  artillery 
and  the  administrative  services.  In  order  to  keep  in  the  vicinity 
of  the  battle,  though  always  at  a  safe  distance  from  the  actual 
front,  the  infantry  and  administrative  troops  will  be  carried 
forward  in  cross-country  transporters,  the  descendants  of  the 
present  motor-bus.  These  transporters  will  be  lightly  armoured 
and  constructed  so  that  they  may  be  made  gas-proof,  and  endowed 
with  a  sufficient  speed  to  enable  them  to  escape  from  their  strong- 
holds should  the  tank  mine-sweepers,  which  tank  mine-layers 
will  render  necessary,  succeed  in  clearing  a  way  through  the  mine- 
fields. Lastly,  as  warfare  is  likely  to  become  more  and  more 
mobile  in  nature,  the  slow  digging  hand  spade  will  be  replaced 
by  the  fast  digging  cross-country  trench  digger,  so  that,  when 
halted,  the  infantry  and  their  transporters  will  be  able  to  seek 
cover  by  ground  in  order  to  protect  themselves  from  aircraft 
attack. 

From  the  above  we  may  predict  that  the  tank  will  rapidly 
revolutionize  existing  modes  of  warfare.  Cavalry  is  likely  to 
disappear,  except  perhaps  as  mounted  police  ;  infantry  may 
become  the  "  queen  of  fortresses,"  but  on  the  battlefield  the 
rule  of  this  monarch  is  rapidly  drawing  to  an  end,  for  without 
offensive  power  this  queen  is  bereft  of  her  crown.  Artillery 
will  become  doubly  important,  and,  as  speed  is  added  to  this 
arm,  the  old  naval  struggle  between  gun  and  armour  will  find  its 
counterpart  on  land.  Then  will  the  infantry  tank,  as  we  know 
it  to-day,  disappear  and  be  replaced  by  the  heavy  gunned  and 
strongly  armoured  land  battleship — the  artillery  of  the  future  : 


164  The  Reformation  of  War 

then  will  the  cavalry  tank,  relying  on  less  armour  and  greater 
speed,  become  the  battle  cruiser.  Numerous  auxiliary  machines 
may  be  built,  but,  as  long  as  armies  are  obsessed  by  the  idea  of 
killing,  I  believe  that,  on  these  two  types,  the  land  battles  of 
the  future  will  be  founded,  battles  which  will  be  fought  after  the 
fashion  of  Alexander — the  hoplites  disorganizing  and  the  cata- 
phracti  annihilating  the  enemy. 

Before  depicting  a  battle  between  these  armoured  packets 
of  men,  I  will  examine  how  they  can  be  supplied  before,  during 
and  after  battle,  for,  in  the  future,  as  in  the  past,  so  long  as 
humanity  wars,  so  long  will  armies  continue  to  march  on  their 
stomachs. 

In  war,  the  chief  concern  of  the  soldier  is  not  to  kill,  but  to 
live.  He  fixes  his  eyes  on  the  communications  of  the  army 
to  which  he  belongs,  and  is  terrified  if  they  are  threatened  by 
the  enemy.  Why  is  this  ?  Because  on  their  integrity  depends 
the  supply  of  his  bread,  beer  and  beef.  It  is  mainly  for  this 
reason  that  communications  play  so  important  a  part  in  land 
warfare.  In  naval  warfare  they  are  also  important,  but  in  a 
smaller  degree,  for,  while  the  average  road  is  only  thirty  to 
forty  feet  wide,  the  sea  offers  a  vast  area  which  can  be  traversed 
in  four  directions  in  place  of  two.  If  it  were  possible  to  move 
armies  as  we  move  ships,  we  should  entirely  revolutionize  the  art 
of  war.  Curious  to  relate  we  can  do  this,  for,  I  have  shown 
that,  not  only  must  infantry  get  into  tanks,  but  gunners  and 
troopers  must  do  the  same,  and,  if  all  these  arms  do  get  into  tanks, 
it  would  be  truly  a  comic  organization  should,  for  means  of 
movement,  their  administrative  services  continue  to  depend  on 
the  horse.  Naturally  they  will  not  do  so,  but  will  equip  them 
selves  with  cross-country  tractors  and  transporters.  Wheels  will 
disappear  from  lorries,  cookers,  and  limbered  vehicles,  and 
tracks  will  replace  them. 

What  shall  we  then  see  ?  Armies  liberated  from  roads ; 
armies  ceasing  to  move  like  gigantic  human  serpents  ;  armies 
which  can  move  deployed  if  their  commanders  so  wish  it,  with 
all  their  necessary  supply  vehicles  immediately  in  rear  of  them, 


The  Future  of  Land  Warfare  165 

and  not  at  the  tails  of  columns  a  day's  march  in  length.  The 
administrative  personnel  and  garrison  troops  can  be  carried  in 
cross-country  omnibuses  ;  the  fighting  troops  can  be  supplied 
not  only  with  the  munitions  of  war,  but  with  tents,  hot  meals, 
cool  drinks,  bedding  and  blankets. 

Roads,  though  they  have  proved  a  strategical  blessing,  have 
frequently  proved  a  tactical  curse.  In  the  past,  in  roadless 
countries,  the  soldier  has  often  fared  but  little  better  than  a 
neolithic  savage,  and  in  well-roaded  ones,  such  as  Flanders, 
scarcely  as  well  as  the  inhabitants  of  a  slum,  and  all  because 
wheeled  vehicles  demand  roads,  and  where  roads  do  not  exist 
pack  animals  or  coolies  alone  can  be  used  ;  and,  where  they  do, 
they  seldom  permit  of  more  than  two  streams  of  vehicles  passing 
along  them  simultaneously,  and  then  only  if  they  are  clear  of 
troops.  The  tank  carries  its  own  roadway  in  its  tracks  ;  it  does 
not,  therefore,  need  a  road  ;  it  can,  therefore,  look  upon  a  road  or 
roadless  country  with  unconcern,  and  in  this  indifference,  without 
probing  very  deep,  we  may  discover  an  entirely  new  epoch  in 
the  art  of  war — the  epoch  of  roadless  tactics. 

When  we  contemplate  the  wars  of  the  future,  the  recent 
war  with  its  trenches  and  its  canteens  will  appear  a  very  leisurely 
affair.  There  will  be  no  ten  days'  mobilization,  and  less  getting 
in  and  out  of  trains,  for  war  in  the  air  will  force  pace  upon  the 
earth.  There  will  be  no  time  to  select  and  prepare  landing-places, 
or  to  take  over  some  friendly  harbour  ;  besides  the  obvious 
landing  points  will  have  been  marked  down  by  the  enemy,  and  will 
be  drenched  with  persistent  gases  long  before  we  reach  them. 
Further  than  this,  we  do  not  want  the  enemy  to  know  where  we 
are  going,  for,  as  surprise  is  always  the  most  powerful  of  weapons, 
we  wish  to  take  him  unawares,  suddenly  springing  at  his  throat. 
Therefore,  when  the  crash  comes,  we  may  expect  to  see  our 
tank  army  of  the  future  mobilize  in  a  few  hours  and  make  for  the 
coast,  either  to  take  to  the  water  or  to  crawl  on  to  tank  carrying 
ships,  which,  under  cover  of  darkness,  will  speed  across  the  sea 
or  possibly  under  it.  These  ships  will  make  for  some  prearranged 
point,  perhaps  a  desolate  stretch  of  sand  dunes,  where  the  tanks 


166  The  Reformation  of  War 

will  either  crawl  ashore  or  take  to  the  water  from  the  ships  and 
swim  towards  the  land. 

As  machines  of  great  size  will  be  difficult  to  hide,  smoke 
clouds  will  be  formed  to  cover  them ;  meanwhile  numerous 
other  smoke  clouds  will  be  created  so  that  the  enemy's  aero- 
planes may  be  misled.  Of  a  hundred  such  clouds,  perhaps 
only  two  or  three  will  cover  tank  forces,  and  then,  at  a  given 
hour,  all  the  clouds  will  move  towards  the  frontiers,  for  they 
will  be  emitted  by  cross-country  machines,  which  will  leave 
a  spoor  behind  them  still  further  to  bewilder  the  enemy's  air- 
men. Presently  the  clouds  will  coalesce  into  one  vast  expanse 
of  smoke,  which,  like  a  gigantic  storm  cloud,  will  roll  over  the 
enemy's  land.  Only  when  it  bursts,  when  the  thunder  of  the 
guns  is  heard,  and  the  flame-projecting  tanks  advance  on  their 
prey,  spouting  forth  sheets  of  fire,  like  tongues  of  lightning, 
will  the  enemy  discover  which  parts  of  the  typhoon  are  alive. 
It  may  then  be  too  late  for  him  to  manoeuvre  his  own  tank  army 
to  meet  the  invader,  or,  if  he  has  gauged  their  position  correctly, 
then  will  a  battle  of  mechanical  monsters  take  place,  each 
monster  controlled  by  a  tiny  brain — its  crew,  upon  the  pluck 
and  determination  of  which,  even  more  so  than  in  the  past, 
will  victory  depend,  for  the  machine  is,  after  all,  but  the  weapon 
of  man  ;    once  a  sword,  to-day  a  rifle,  and  to-morrow  a  tank. 

Rolling  forward  on  its  tracks,  the  war  of  the  future  will 
resemble  a  conflict  of  mobile  fortresses,  followed  by  moving 
supply  dumps.  The  skeleton  of  the  battle  will  be  as  hereto- 
fore ;  there  will  be  the  search,  the  grip,  the  clinch  and  the  over- 
throw, but  on  this  skeleton  will  be  built  up  muscles  of  steel. 
Man  will  remain  the  same,  a  cunning  human  creature  ;  his 
means  of  movement,  his  weapons  and  his  methods  of  protection 
will  alone  have  changed.  If  mechanically  both  sides  are  equal, 
then,  on  the  valour,  obedience  and  sell-sacrifice  of  the  soldier 
will  victory  depend.  But  if  one  side  relies  on  these  virtues 
alone,  and  neglects  to  safeguard  them  by  the  most  powerful 
weapons  obtainable,  then  will  they  be  of  little  value,  as  little 
as  all  the  valour  of  the  Soudanese  was  at  Omdurman.     Moral 


The  Future  of  Land  Warfare  167 

is  the  most  precious  virtue  which  a  soldier  can  possess,  and  as 
we  value  it  so  must  we  protect  it. 

In  the  van  of  the  battle  of  the  future  may  we  watch  the 
scout  tanks,  the  light  cavalry  of  the  army,  retiring  before  the 
side  which  has  gained  the  initiative,  falling  back  on  their 
heavier  machines,  or  away  from  them  to  a  flank  to  draw  the 
enemy  into  a  false  position.  Wireless  reports  will  be  sent  back 
from  the  air  fleet  and  telephoned  on  from  the  flag  tank  to  the 
squadron  leaders,  which  will  manoeuvre  for  ground,  for  position, 
for  light  and  for  wind.  Great  clouds  of  smoke  will  roll  over  the 
battlefield,  under  cover  of  which  mine-laying  tanks  will  move 
forward  to  deny  to  the  enemy's  machines  certain  tactical  posi- 
tions, or  in  the  hope  that,  by  a  calculated  retirement,  they 
may  be  induced  to  attempt  to  advance  across  them.  Destroyer 
tanks  will  dart  forward  to  attack  the  huge  artillery  machines, 
the  capital  ships  of  the  battlefield,  and  succeed  or  be  driven 
back  by  their  like.  Then,  at  length,  will  the  two  sides  clinch, 
and,  amidst  the  whirl  of  smoke  and  gas,  the  thunder  of  the 
guns  and  the  crash  of  steel,  will  one  human  being  impose  the 
will  of  his  army  on  that  of  his  antagonist.  Lastly,  the  pursuit, 
the  roaring  of  engines  and  the  race  to  destroy. 

The  battles  of  the  future  may  be  something  like  this,  or 
even  something  still  more  different  from  the  conflicts  of  the 
recent  war.  Different  they  will  be  ;  so  different,  when  it  is 
realized  that  we  are  now  entering  a  new  epoch  in  warfare,  that 
no  man  can,  with  any  semblance  of  certainty,  say  that  the 
above  picture  is  impossible.  In  it  infantry,  cavalry  and 
artillery,  as  they  are  armed,  mounted,  or  moved  to-day,  have 
no  place — none  !  It  is  impossible  even  to  imagine  them 
partaking  in  such  a  struggle  ;  as  well  pit  a  fleet  of  coracles, 
triremes  and  galleys  against  destroyers,  submarines  and  Dread- 
noughts, as  to  pit  the  frail  arms  of  to-day  against  their  more 
powerful  descendants.  All  things  material  change,  but  one  thing 
immaterial  will  remain  constant — the  will  to  win,  the  soul 
within  the  machine. 

How  different  may  the  battle  be  ;  let  us  for  a  moment  think, 


168  The  Reformation  of  War 

and  then  offer  one  more  speculation.  The  battle  of  machines, 
is  this  the  ultimate  goal  in  warfare  ?  I  do  not  think  so,  for 
a  machine  is  but  a  means  of  waging  war,  a  tool  whereby  men 
seek  to  impose  their  will  upon  each  other.  Once  the  machine 
was  a  bow  and  arrow ;  to-day  it  is  a  rifle  or  a  machine  gun  carried 
on  a  mounting  called  man ;  to-morrow  it  may  be  an  aeroplane 
or  a  tank.  Yet,  whatever  it  be,  it  is  the  will  and  understanding 
of  man  which  the  machine  forces  man  to  accept.  Just  as  in  a 
telephone  the  vibrations  of  the  voice  are  transmitted  by  an 
inaudible  current  of  electricity,  so  also  in  war  is  the  silent  will 
of  one  nation  transmitted  to  its  antagonist  by  means  of  roaring 
tools.  Tools  change,  and  though  in  the  past  the  soldier  has 
generally  been  no  designer,  in  the  future  he  must  become  one 
if  he  is  to  continue  to  impose  his  will  on  his  enemy. 

What  does  this  mean  ?  It  means  that  invention  is  an 
important  branch  of  strategy.  It  means  that  we  must  never 
be  content  with  what  we  have  ;  without  halt  we  must  ever- 
lastingly seek  for  something  better.  If  a  tool  can  be  found,  or 
designed,  against  which  the  enemy  possesses  no  immediate  pro- 
tection, then  this  tool  alone  may  constitute  ninety-nine  per 
cent,  of  victory,  even  if  every  general  in  the  enemy's  army  is 
as  cunning  as  Napoleon,  and  every  private  soldier  as  brave  as 
Marshal  Ney. 

For  a  moment,  I  will  turn  back  to  the  battle  of  machines. 
The  two  great  mechanical  forces  surge  forward  over  the  land, 
while  high  above  in  the  air  another  terrific  conflict  is  being  waged. 
Suddenly  the  whole  of  the  machines  of  one  side  stand  stock 
still,  and  the  whole  of  the  aeroplanes  of  this  same  side  swoop 
down  to  earth  and  crash  upon  the  ground.  Would  not  this 
mean  ninety-nine  per  cent,  of  victory  to  the  side  which  could 
continue  to  move  and  fly  ?  It  would  mean  more,  it  would  be  vic- 
tory itself.  But  how  could  such  a  catastrophe  take  place  ?  The 
answer  is  simple.  The  victorious  side,  all  unknown  to  the 
enemy,  has  discovered  how  to  derange,  by  means  of  etheric 
waves,  the  mechanism  of  the  hostile  tanks  and  aeroplanes. 
Perhaps  the  antidote  is  but  a  leaden  box  or  a  glass  container 


The  Future  of  Land  Warfare  169 

costing  a  few  shillings,  which  could  be  turned  out  by  the  tens 
of  thousands  in  a  few  days.  What  does  this  matter,  so  long 
as  the  enemy  does  not  possess  it,  for  in  twenty  seconds  his  entire 
army  will  be  immobilized  by  perhaps  one  man ! 

Does  this  mean  that  tanks  and  aeroplanes  are  useless,  and 
should,  consequently,  be  scrapped  ?  Certainly,  if  the  means 
of  safeguarding  them  are  of  as  little  value  as  a  woollen  jacket 
against  a  bullet  ;  otherwise,  no  !  It  means  this  :  that  nothing 
devised  by  human  brains  is  perfect,  there  is  ever  a  recoil,  there 
is  always  room  for  improvement,  and  that  side  which  gains 
supremacy  in  invention  and  design  is  the  side  which  is  going 
to  win  the  next  war.  In  the  past,  wars  have  frequently  been 
decided  by  man-power ;  in  the  future  they  will  almost  certainly 
be  decided  by  machine-power,  begotten  of  brain-power — possibly 
in  a  single  test-tube  may  be  discovered  the  secret  of  the  conquest 
of  the  world  ! 


IX 

THE   FUTURE   OF   SEA  WARFARE 

IN  this  Chapter  I  will  first  recapitulate  what  has  gone  before, 
so  that  the  reader,  before  considering  the  future  of  sea 
warfare,  may  be  certain  of  his  starting-point.  In  Chapters 
IV.  and  V.,  I  examined  the  nature  of  the  Great  War  and 
its  tendencies,  and  I  showed,  how  out  of  the  cavern  of  brute- 
force  timorously  crept  forth,  like  a  wee  mouse,  the  idea  of  the 
moral  attack.  Then  in  Chapters  VI.  and  VII.,  I  examined  the 
instruments  of  this  attack — gas,  which  would  humanize  the 
bullet,  and  aircraft,  which  would  transport  gas  and,  by  directing 
it  against  the  will  of  a  nation,  reduce  the  horrors  of  bloodshed 
and  destruction.  Thus  were  opened  before  us  the  portals  of 
a  warlike  Eden ;  yet,  like  Eden  of  old,  within  dwelt  the  serpent 
closely  twined  around  the  ancient  trunk  of  the  tree  of  life, 
whose  sap  is  drawn  from  the  blood  of  warriors  and  whose  ever 
falling  leaves  are  battles  lost.  In  Chapter  VIII.,  the  snake 
moved  its  coils,  unwound  itself,  and  offering  to  us  the  gas-proof 
tank,  seduced  us  from  the  narrow  path  which  leads  to  the  true 
objective  of  war.  Like  Adam,  we  eat  of  the  fruit  of  death 
and  are  fallen  ;  yet  without  this  fall  there  can  be  no  redemption, 
and,  as  good  is  the  recoil  of  evil,  so  shall  we  discover  that,  out 
of  the  horrific  struggle  of  monstrous  machines,  nations  may 
advance  yet  one  march  further  towards  the  bloodless  battle- 
fields of  the  future. 

Studious  reader,  remember  ever  that  we  can  only  progress 
from  evil  to  good,  and  that,  as  the  good  in  humanity  grows  old, 
in  its  perfection  is  begotten  its  corruption,  within  which  is  con- 
ceived its  redemption.     I  have  shown  how,  by  gas  and  air, 

170 


The  Future  of  Sea  Warfare  171 

warfare  may  be  humanized,  and  how,  by  petrol  and  steel,  it 
may  become  re-brutalized.  But,  pause  before  you  deliver  judg- 
ment, for  the  battle  of  petrol-driven  steel,  appalling  as  it  may 
seem,  is  not  so  brutal  as  the  battle  of  blood-driven  muscle. 
Why  is  this  ?     I  will  explain. 

Time  is  the  controlling  factor  in  war,  it  is  the  urge  of  armies. 
The  more  rapid  the  assembly,  the  quicker  the  battle ;  the  quicker 
the  battle,  the  more  speedy  the  victory,  and  victory  is  the  postern 
of  peace.  Petrol  economizes  time  in  war,  caterpillar  tracks  or 
aircraft  propellers  economize  space.  Economy  in  time  and 
space  are  the  sire  and  dam  of  surprise,  and  surprise  is  the  true 
sword  of  victory. 

Power  to  move  in  all  directions  introduces  into  strategy 
and  tactics  a  new  meaning,  which  will  demand  a  higher  type 
of  mind  than  has  ever  been  required  in  past  wars.  The  more 
cunning  this  mind  becomes,  the  more  deadly  will  be  the  result 
of  its  overthrow.  Heretofore,  war  minds  were  small  and  war 
bodies  were  big ;  armies  were  like  certain  reptiles — their  brain 
could,  on  occasion,  be  actually  removed  without  influencing 
the  wrigglings  of  their  bodies.  War  is  fast  outgrowing  the 
reptilian  stage,  and,  when  mind  expands,  man  will  realize 
what  the  objective  of  war  demands.  Then  will  the  desire  of  the 
soldier  be  to  avoid  rather  than  meet  the  army  of  his  adversary, 
so  that  in  place  he  may  be  free  to  attack  the  will  and  nerves 
of  the  hostile  nation.  Frequently,  he  will  not  be  able  to  do 
so,  nevertheless,  he  must  never  lose  sight  of  his  main  objective, 
for,  as  in  war,  moral  is  to  the  physical  as  three  to  one,  so  is  a 
successful  moral  attack  not  only  three  but  thirty,  possibly  three 
hundred,  times  as  effective  as  a  physical  onslaught. 

While  battles  are  raging  in  the  air,  battles  which  may  be 
won  in  hours  or  days  in  place  of  months  or  years,  on  land  must 
an  army  not  only  seek  out  the  enemy,  but  must  race  towards 
his  vitals — his  aerodromes,  dockyards,  chemical  factories, 
workshops  and  seats  of  government.  Undoubtedly  will  the 
enemy  attempt  to  protect  these  by  means  of  his  military  forces, 
and    undoubtedly   will    his    adversary   attempt     to    hack   his 


172  The  Reformation  of  War 

shield  to  pieces,  and,  if  it  be  shattered,  what  then  ?  A  with- 
drawal followed  by  reconstruction  ?  No  ;  for,  within  a  few  years, 
it  will  be  possible  for  a  mechanical  army  to  sweep  from  the 
Seine  to  the  Vistula  in  seven  days. 

If  the  shield  is,  however,  not  hacked  to  pieces,  what  shall 
we  see  ?  While  the  axe  is  being  wielded  against  it,  aircraft, 
like  arrows,  will  speed  over  it  ;  and  fast  moving  tank  forces, 
like  javelins,  will  shiver  past  its  flanks,  and  these  will  transfix 
the  civil  brains  of  the  enemy  with  terror.  Which  side  will 
outlast  the  other,  this  has  always  been  a  vital  question  in  war  ? 
In  the  recent  war,  over  four  years  were  required  wherein  to 
undermine  the  German  moral ;  in  the  days  of  Napoleon  it 
took  twenty-two  years  to  undermine  that  of  the  French.  In 
the  recent  war,  had  the  Germans  won  the  battle  of  the  Marne, 
the  war  might  have  been  won  in  six  weeks,  and,  be  it  well  re- 
membered, the  German  muscle-moving  armies  took  four  weeks 
to  cover  the  150  miles  which  separates  Liege  from  the  outskirts 
of  Paris.  To-day,  the  aeroplane  can  cover  this  distance  in  one 
hour,  and,  in  a  few  years  to  come,  a  tank  will  be  able  to  accom- 
plish this  journey  in  one  day.  Bearing  in  mind  such  rapidity 
of  movement,  it  becomes  almost  a  certainty  that,  in  the  next 
great  war,  the  endurance  of  civil  moral  will  be  in  direct  propor- 
tion to  the  speed  of  the  war  machines  used  ;  consequently, 
the  duration  of  wars  will  be  short,  and,  as  I  will  now  show, 
the  power  which  can  command  the  seas  is  the  power  which  will 
hold  the  winning  card. 

Sea  warfare,  like  land  or  air  warfare,  is  but  a  means  towards 
an  end,  and  as  man  is  a  terrestrial  animal  and  not  an  aquatic 
or  aerial  beast,  he  lives  and  breeds  on  the  land,  and  over  ninety 
per  cent. of  his  activities  are  connected  with  the  land ;  consequently, 
of  all  the  military  means  employed  by  a  nation  to  impose  its  will 
on  another,  sea  warfare  is  the  least  direct. 

The  military  obj  ective  is  attained  through  two  great  activities  : 
liberty  of  movement  and  liberty  of  action.  The  first  I  will  call 
the  strategical  objective  and  the  second  the  tactical.  The  aim 
of  the  first  is  to  place  an  armed  force  in  such  a  position  that  it 


The  Future  of  Sea  Warfare  178 

may  attain  the  second — namely,  victory,  at  the  lowest  cost  in  men, 
money,  material  and  honour.  Normally,  victory  is  to  be  sought 
on  land,  because  man  primarily  belongs  to  the  earth.  In  primitive 
times  this  condition  was  absolute,  but,  as  civilization  advanced, 
nations  became  more  and  more  dependent  on  each  other's  efforts 
for  supply  of  food,  clothing  and  other  commodities,  with  the 
result  that  sea  roads  were  added  to  land  roads  and  highly  organized 
fleets  to  armies.  The  first,  to-day,  constitute  the  great  strategical 
forces,  especially  in  maritime  powers,  and  the  second  the  great 
tactical  forces. 

As  the  military  policy  of  a  virile  nation  is  to  impose  its  will 
on  its  antagonist,  the  sooner  it  can  do  so  the  less  commercial 
capital  will  it  expend,  and  the  less  disorganization  of  existing 
markets,  whether  in  its  own  hands  or  in  those  of  its  enemies  and 
allies  or  neutrals,  will  result. 

In  wars  originating  through  trade  competition,  the  object 
is  visibly  not  to  kill,  wound,  or  plunder  the  enemy,  but  simply 
to  persuade  him,  by  both  moral  and  physical  force,  that  acceptance 
of  this  policy  will  prove  more  profitable  than  its  refusal ;  for  to 
kill,  wound  and  plunder  is  to  destroy  or  debilitate  a  future  buyer 
— it  is,  in  fact,  a  direct  attack  on  the  competitive  impulse  which 
is  the  foundation  of  prosperity. 

I  have  already  shown  that  the  most  rapid  method  of  enforcing 
a  policy  is  not  to  destroy  but  to  capture,  morally  and  physically, 
an  enemy's  government  and  so  compel  it  to  agree — a  man  pinned 
down  with  a  pistol  pointed  at  his  head  does  not  argue.  Enemy 
governments,  being  land  organizations,  must  be  captured  on  land. 
In  order  to  prevent  so  dire  a  fate  they  protect  themselves  by 
armies,  and,  if  the  countries  they  govern  possess  sea  coasts, 
they  raise  navies  in  order  to  protect  their  communications  with 
other  countries  and  so  prevent  the  invasion  of  their  territories, 
or  to  assist  in  their  invading  those  of  their  enemies.  If  we 
carry  this  analysis  a  little  further  we  shall  find  that  fleets  exist 
for  four  primary  purposes  in  war  : 

(i.)  To  protect  the  transportation  of  armies,  as  took  place 


174  The  Reformation  of  War 

in  the  Crimean  War,   the  Russo-Japanese  War  and  the 

Great  War  of  1914-1918. 
(ii.)  To  compel  an   enemy  to  disperse  his  main  army  by 

landing  or   by  threatening   to  land  troops,   such  as  the 

landings   in   Portugal   and   Spain   during   the   Peninsular 

War,  and  the  Gallipoli,  Salonika  and  Archangel  landings 

during  the  Great  War. 
(iii.)  To  protect  the  transportation  of  supplies,  as  took  place 

in    the    Dutch    Wars   of   the    seventeenth    century,    the 

Napoleonic  Wars  and  the  Great  War. 
(iv.)  To  impede  or  completely  prevent  supplies  of  all  natures 

being  shipped  to  the  enemy's  country,  as  was  attempted 

during  the  Dutch  Wars,  the  American  Civil  War  and  the 

Great  War. 

The  four  primary  purposes  of  a  fleet  may  be  condensed  into 
two — namely,  the  military  purpose  of  a  fleet  and  the  economic 
purpose,  which  together  may  be  expressed  in  one  term  :  "  Com- 
mand of  the  Sea,"  or  the  power  of  controlling  movement  over 
the  water  in  order  to  maintain  and  secure  national  policy,  which 
in  its  highest  form,  is  survival  with  prosperity,  honour  and  con- 
tentment. 

As  the  ultimate  aim  of  a  fleet  is  to  gain  or  maintain  command 
of  the  sea — that  is,  liberty  of  movement  and  action  on  the  water — 
consequently,  its  object  is  to  clear  the  sea  of  all  hostile  ships, 
either  by  sinking  or  blockading  them,  and  until  this  objective 
has  been  gained,  the  purposes  of  a  fleet  cannot,  without  grave 
risk,  be  accomplished. 

For  any  nation  to  possess  complete  freedom  of  the  sea,  it 
is  necessary  for  its  fleet  to  be  in  a  position  to  guarantee  its  military 
and  economic  purposes.  Before  the  invention  of  the  submarine 
this  was  difficult  enough,  even  when  surface  superiority  was  most 
marked,  as  was  the  case  with  the  British  Fleet  from  1806  to  1815, 
during  which  period,  nevertheless,  hundreds  of  merchantmen 
were  yearly  sunk  or  captured  by  the  enemy.  Since  the  intro- 
duction of  the  submarine,   a  complete  guarantee  or  anything 


The  Future  of  Sea  Warfare  175 

approaching  secure  command  is  no  longer  possible ;  conse- 
quently, the  question  which  should  now  be  perplexing  naval 
brains  is  not  that  of  battleships  versus  submarines,  or  vice  versa, 
but  rather,  what  constitutes  the  intrinsic  values  of  these  two 
types  of  vessels  in  the  maintenance  of  command  of  the  sea  against 
all  prospective  enemies  ? 

It  must  first  of  all  be  realized  that  the  submersible  vessel 
has  introduced  a  third  dimensional  movement  into  the  art  of 
naval  warfare,  which  differs  fundamentally  from  third  dimen- 
sional means  of  movement  in  the  air,  in  that,  while  the  air  offers 
no  direct  protection  to  aircraft,  water  offers  a  more  complete 
protection  to  the  submarine  than  does  a  trench  to  a  soldier. 
A  submarine,  in  fact,  possesses  the  power  to  enter  her  "  dug- 
out," at  most  points  on  the  surface  of  the  sea,  at  will,  and  thus 
protect  herself  from  hostile  attack,  but  while  submerged  she 
possesses  no  more  offensive  power  than  does  the  soldier  in  his 
underground  shelter.  The  main  characteristic  of  the  submarine 
is,  in  fact,  her  power  to  evade  a  fight  and  not  her  power  to  seek 
combat  on  equal  terms  with  surface  craft. 

This  power  of  evasion  introduces  a  new  problem  into  naval 
warfare.  On  the  surface,  the  submarine  in  fighting  power  is 
inferior  to  the  surface  warships,  because,  at  present,  she  cannot 
give  the  same  number  of  blows  or  withstand  an  equal  hammering, 
but  by  diving  she  can  normally  avoid,  even  at  close  quarters, 
receiving  any  blows  at  all.  Though  this  protective  power 
possessed  by  the  submarine  has  greatly  influenced  the  economic 
purpose  of  a  fleet,  because  on  the  surface  the  submarine  is  far 
more  powerful  offensively  than  an  armed  merchantman,  up  to 
the  present  this  power  has  had  little  influence  on  the  military 
purpose  of  a  fleet,  because  this  purpose  is  still  accomplished  on 
the  surface,  and  on  the  surface  her  power  of  evasion  is  lost. 
If,  however,  this  military  purpose  could  be  accomplished  under 
the  surface,  surface  craft  would  be  all  but  impotent  to  prevent 
it.  Such  a  possibility  would  reduce  the  actions  of  a  fleet  to  that 
of  commerce  protection,  surface  craft  becoming  but  mere  escorts 
to  merchant  vessels. 


176  The  Reformation  of  War 

Before  examining  this  stupendous  possibility,  which,  if  feasible, 
will  revolutionize  the  whole  outlook  of  naval  warfare,  I  intend 
returning  to  the  question  of  surprise,  which  I  have  called — the 
true  sword  of  victory. 

In  the  past,  sea  power,  when  properly  used,  has  enabled  in- 
numerable surprisals  to  be  effected,  such  as  the  landing  of  Sir 
John  Moore  in  Portugal  in  1809  and  the  Japanese  at  Chemulpo 
in  1904.  These  surprisals  have,  however,  normally  demanded 
one  condition — command  of  the  surface  of  the  seas,  and,  in  order 
to  gain  this  command,  the  enemy's  fleet  has  either  to  be  destroyed 
or  blockaded.  In  the  days  of  sailing  ships  temporary  command 
frequently  sufficed.  In  1805,  Napoleon  hoped  to  gain  such  a 
condition,  by  enticing  Nelson  and  his  ships  away  from  the  English 
Channel  to  the  West  Indies.  Since  the  introduction  of  steamships, 
this  temporary  ability  to  evade,  and  so  attack  the  will  of  a  hostile 
nation  overseas,  has  become  more  and  more  difficult,  until, 
to-day,  however  perfect  the  surface  command  may  be,  as  long 
as  the  enemy  possesses  a  few  submarines,  not  necessarily 
supremacy  in  submarines,  such  operations  become  exceedingly 
hazardous. 

I  have  already  shown  in  Chapter  VII.  the  extreme  danger 
that  large  battleships  will  run  if  they  are  attacked  simultaneously 
by  submarines  and  aircraft.  Day  by  day,  evidence  is  accumu- 
lating to  show  that  the  age  of  the  present  naval  Brontosaur  is 
nearing  its  end.  For  ten  or  fifteen  years,  these  immense  and 
costly  ships,  veritable  Titans  of  brute-force,  may  continue,  but 
their  dotage  is  in  view,  because  the  objective  in  naval  warfare 
is  not  to  sink  steel,  but  to  impose  a  policy  on  the  enemy.  Suppos- 
ing, however,  that  I  am  wrong  and  that  a  Super-Super-Dread- 
nought will  be  able  to  keep  afloat  in  face  of  a  dual  three-dimen- 
sional attack,  even  then  will  not  the  submarine  greatly  restrict 
her  activities  ? 

"As  an  engine  of  destruction,"  writes  Admiral  Daveluy, 
"  the  submarine  is  admirable,  because — a  fact  unique  in  history 
— she  does  not  come  under  the  law  of  numbers  by  reason  of  her 
invisibility  :  one  unit  of  small  tonnage  can  attack  enemy's  forces, 


The  Future  of  Sea  Warfare  177 

no  matter  how  numerous  or  powerful."*  A  submarine  in  the 
Pacific  Ocean,  as  Mr.  Bywater  points  out,  though  she  might  not 
be  able  to  sink  an  American  battleship,  she  can  normally  injure 
her.  To  tow  a  Super-Dreadnought  across  several  thousand 
miles  of  water  "  would  be  hopeless  if  enemy  submarines  were 
about. "f  Besides  direct  attack,  submarines  can  indirectly 
attack  a  fleet  by  sowing  mine-fields  in  the  neighbourhood  of 
naval  ports,  by  forcing  an  enemy  to  cease  offensive  construction 
and  concentrate  on  the  building  of  protective  anti-submarine 
craft.  Again,  with  fleets  based  on  oilless  countries,  the  submarine 
can  strike  at  the  capital  ship  economically  by  sinking  her  oil 
tankers.  As  regards  this  very  important  use  of  the  submarine 
to  starve  the  engines  of  a  fleet  Mr.  Bywater  writes  : 

'  ...  if  experience  in  the  world  war  counts  for  anything,  the 
losses  among  these  vessels  would  be  enormous.  During  that  conflict 
no  less  than  244  colliers  and  44  oil  tankers  in  the  service  of  the  British 
Admiralty  were  sunk,  mainly  by  enemy  action.  .  .  .  Ships  of  this 
type  are  peculiarly  vulnerable  to  submarine  attack  owing  to  their 
great  length  and  low  speed.  So  serious  were  the  casualties  suffered 
that  the  reserve  of  oil  fuel  for  the  British  Fleet  was  gradually  reduced 
to  an  eight  weeks'  supply.  .  .  .  The  bulk  of  these  losses  were  suffered 
...  a  few  hundred  miles  from  the  English  coast  in  an  area  which 
was  closely  patrolled. "X 

From  the  above  it  would  appear  that  the  unanimity  of  the 
British  press,  on  the  receipt  of  Mr.  Balfour's  declamation  against 
the  submarine,  made  during  the  Washington  Disarmament 
Conference,  was  not  due  to  her  uselessness  in  naval  warfare, 
but  to  the  fact  that  her  power  is  so  great  that  the  British  surface 
supremacy  of  the  seas  is  imperilled.  If  this  be  the  true  cause, 
then  it  would  be  wise  to  acknowledge  it.  To  force  the  head  of 
the  British  public  under  the  sands  of  untruthfulness  is  scarcely 
an  action  which  deserves  applause. 

Now  that  I  have  examined  the  influence  of  the  submarine  on 

*  "  Les  Enseignements  Mari times  de  la  Guerre  Anti-Germanique,"  Contre- 
Amiral  Daveluy,  Part  I.,  Chapter  I. 

|  "  Sea  Power  in  the  Pacific,"  H.  C.  Bywater,  p.  290. 

I   Ibid.,  pp.  274,  275. 

12 


178  The  Reformation  of  War 

the  military  purpose  of  surface  craft,  I  will  show  how  this  purpose 
can  be  accomplished  by  moving  an  invading  force  not  on  the 
surface  of  the  water  but  under  it. 

The  object  of  a  fleet,  as  I  have  stated,  is  to  maintain  command 
of  the  sea  in  order  to  enable  both  traders  and  soldiers  to  move 
freely  across  the  waters.  This  objective  is  gained  by  compelling 
an  enemy  to  accept  a  policy  which  guarantees  this  free  movement, 
and,  if  the  enemy  refused  to  accept  this  policy,  in  accordance  with 
the  old  theory  of  naval  warfare  his  fleet  was  either  destroyed  or 
blockaded,  that  is  immobilized. 

In  itself,  this  destruction  or  restriction  of  the  enemy's  naval 
power  was  but  a  means  of  accomplishing  one  of  two  naval  pur- 
poses. Once  command  had  been  secured,  the  hostile  will  could 
either  be  attacked,  directly,  by  landing  an  army  on  the  enemy's 
shores,  or  indirectly,  by  striking  at  his  stomach  by  cutting  off  his 
food  supply.  If  the  enemy's  country  were  self-supporting,  then 
the  second  action  was  normally  so  prolonged  that  it  was  ruled  out 
of  account.  As  generally  the  enemy's  fleet  had  to  be  destroyed 
or  captured  before  complete  command  could  be  guaranteed,  by 
degrees  these  means  obscured  the  end,  so  that  a  tradition  was 
created  that  the  sole  object  of  a  fleet  was  to  destroy  another  fleet. 

As  submarines  can,  however,  move  under  the  surface,  the  com- 
manding surface  fleet  can  be  avoided.  This  means  that  the 
economic  purpose  can  still  be  fulfilled.  To  carry  out,  however, 
the  military  purpose,  as  long  as  a  traditional  army  is  maintained, 
would  demand  such  an  enormous  number  of  submarines  that  it 
becomes  impracticable.  Should,  however,  the  nature  of  such  an 
army  be  so  changed  that  a  powerful  force  could  be  moved  by 
submarines  under  the  water,  it  would  then  be  possible  to  gain 
command  of  the  sea,  not  by  destroying  the  enemy's  fleet  or  by 
blockading  it,  but  by  avoiding  it  and  attacking  the  will  of  the 
hostile  nation  upon  which  the  stability  of  the  fleet  is  based.  In 
fact,  what  is  contemplated  here  is,  in  place  of  hopping  over  an 
army  by  using  aeroplanes,  to  dive  under  a  fleet  by  using  sub- 
marines ;  in  both  cases  the  objective  is  the  same,  namely,  the  will 
of  the  hostile  nation.     If  this  can  be  accomplished,  then  the  sub- 


The  Future  of  Sea  Warfare  179 

marine  will  become  the  most  potent  of  naval  weapons,  surface 
craft  simply  being  maintained  to  protect  merchantmen  from 
submarine  attack.  This  will  mean  that  the  big  capital  ship  will 
eventually  go  out  of  commission  and  be  replaced  by  smaller  and 
more  mobile  vessels. 

During  the  Great  War,  the  British  Navy  obtained  surface 
control  so  completely  that  it  accomplished,  within  the  limitations 
of  the  existing  land  forces,  its  military  purpose  to  the  full. 
Though  the  command  of  the  surface  of  the  sea  was  guaranteed, 
surface  craft  were  so  powerless  to  maintain  their  economic  pur- 
pose that  Great  Britain  was  almost  brought  to  her  knees  by  the 
German  submarine  attack,  during  which  8,500,000  tons  of 
British  shipping  were  sent  to  the  bottom. 

There  are  two  ways  of  attacking  a  ship  physically ;  the  first, 
when  she  is  at  sea  and  the  second  when  she  is  in  harbour,  and  the 
submarine  is  no  exception  to  this  rule.  Successful  invasion  and 
the  seizing  of  the  enemy's  naval  bases  is,  from  the  general  military 
standpoint,  a  severer  blow  than  the  mere  destruction  of  his  fleet 
at  sea.  To  strike  at  his  ports  is  to  strike  at  the  focal  points  of  his 
sea  communications.  A  fleet  alone  can  seldom  do  this,  neither 
can  the  army  of  an  inland  power  accomplish  such  an  operation 
single-handed. 

The  Russo-Japanese  war  of  1 904-1905  illustrated  clearly 
the  paramount  importance  of  military  co-operation  in  naval 
enterprises  of  this  nature,  and  accentuated  the  fact  that  "  the  de- 
struction of  the  enemy's  ships  in  harbour  is  as  important  as  their 
destruction  at  sea."*  Curious  to  relate,  however,  these  object- 
lessons  were  entirely  lost  on  British  military  and  naval  thought  ; 
the  "  blue  water  "  school  killed  the  "  coast  attack,"  and  the  de- 
claration of  war  in  1914  found  the  British  Navy  and  army  en- 
tirely unprepared  to  carry  out  such  operations,  which  the  war, 
throughout  its  course,  constantly  demanded. 

Lord  Jellicoe  writes  :  "  Against  Ostend  and  Zeebrugge,  no 
permanent  result  could  be  achieved  by  the  Navy  alone.  ..." 

*  "Combined  Operations,"  Major-General  Sir  George  Ash  ton,  K.C.B.,  Jour- 
nal of  the  R.U.S.I.,  February,  1920. 

12* 


180  The  Reformation  of  War 

And  again  :  "  The  feasible  landing-places,  so  far  as  we  were  con- 
cerned, were  unsuited  to  military  strategy.  .  .  ."*  Why  ? 
Because  either  naval  action  would  have  to  be  heavily  supported 
by  costly  land  attacks,  or  else  troops  must  be  landed  from  in- 
numerable lighters,  barges  and  small  craft.  I  will  now  show  that, 
by  means  of  submarines,  it  will  be  possible,  in  the  near  future,  to 
land,  on  any  ordinary  beach,  a  formidable  military  force  as  a 
complete  surprise. 

The  first  tank  operation  ever  planned  was  for  a  landing  on  the 
Flanders  coast.  In  1917,  this  idea  was  revived  and  an  account  of 
it  is  given  in  Admiral  Sir  Reginald  Bacon's  book,  "  The  Dover 
Patrol."  Within  ten  years  of  the  present  date  it  is  all  but  a 
certainty  that  a  reliable  self-propelled  water-crossing  tank  will 
be  invented,  a  machine  of  under  twelve  tons  with  a  speed  on  land 
of  over  20  miles  an  hour  and  an  extensive  radius  of  action.  It  is 
not  impossible  to  suppose  that  a  submarine  could  be  built  to  carry 
six  of  these  machines,  and  that  a  squadron  of  ten  of  these  sub- 
marines, supported  by  a  few  submarine  monitors  and  submarine 
gas-projecting  vessels,  might  appear  off  the  enemy's  coast-line  or  a 
selected  harbour,  and,  at  the  most  unexpected  of  moments,  and 
far  distant  from  any  land  supporting  forces,  suddenly,  under  cover 
of  gas  and  smoke  clouds  and  fifteen-inch  gun  and  howitzer  shells, 
land  sixty  tanks  in  a  quarter  that  number  of  minutes.  Within 
an  hour  or  two,  the  point  selected  might  be  destroyed  and  the 
tanks  re-embarked,  making  their  way  home  on  the  surface  or 
below  it.  There  is  nothing  impossible  in  such  an  attack,  there  is 
nothing  impossible  in  such  a  landing  ;  it  is  feasible,  it  is  common- 
sense,  and  it  is  yet  another  answer  to  the  submarine  peril,  for  the 
navy  which  can  effect  such  an  operation  first  is  the  navy  which  is 
first  going  to  destroy  its  enemy's  submarine  bases.  Here,  then, 
is  a  new  reading  to  Sir  Walter  Raleigh's  famous  exclamation  : 

"  I  say  that  an  army  to  be  transported  over  sea  and  to  be  landed 
again  in  an  enemy's  country,  and  the  place  left  to  the  choice  of  the 
invader,  cannot  be  resisted  on  the  coast  of  England  without  a  fleet 

*  "  The  Crisis  of  the  Naval  War." 


The  Future  of  Sea  Warfare  181 

to  impeach  it.  .  .  .  For  there  is  no  man  so  ignorant,  that  ships  without 
putting  themselves  out  of  breath,  will  easily  outrun  the  soldiers 
that  coast  them."* 

But  the  difference  is  this  :  a  fleet  will  not  know  how  to  im- 
peach such  a  landing,  neither  will  the  soldier  know  where  to  run, 
for,  in  the  words  of  Bacon  :  "  Secrecy  and  celerity  are  the  life  of 
despatch  in  all  military  operations,"  and  here  this  secrecy  and 
celerity  will  be  accentuated  in  their  maximum  degree,  and  may 
be  assisted  by  a  simultaneous  attack  from  the  air. 

The  above  example  of  a  physical  attack  delivered  by  tanks 
transported  by  submarines  against  a  military  or  naval  objective 
should  only  be  regarded  as  a  stepping-stone  to  a  moral  attack  on 
the  nerves  and  will  of  the  hostile  nation.  Indeed,  such  an  attack 
is  less  difficult,  since  military  objectives  can  hit  back,  while  the  civil 
population,  deficient  of  military  protection,  is  at  the  mercy  of  an 
invader. 

In  the  last  Chapter,  I  showed  that,  on  account  of  the  tank 
being  able  to  protect  itself  against  the  aeroplane,  the  brute  force 
theory  of  war  would  find  a  new  outlet  in  the  tank  versus  tank 
battle.  Further  I  showed  that,  though  the  enemy's  tank  army 
would  demand  a  concentration  of  an  equal  or  superior  force  of 
tanks  against  it  in  order  to  restrict  its  activities,  every  effort 
should  be  made  by  small  detachments  of  machines  to  avoid  the 
main  hostile  force,  so  that  they  may  strike  at  the  moral  of  the 
civil  population  behind  this  force.  A  moment's  consideration 
will  at  once  cause  us  to  realize  what  a  potent  weapon  the  sub- 
marine-carried tank  will  be  in  the  moral  attack. 

For  a  continental  power  to  invade  the  British  Isles  by  means 
of  submarine-transported  tanks  would  be  a  difficult  operation, 
unless  the  blow  were  delivered  as  a  complete  surprise.  But  for  an 
island  power,  such  as  Great  Britain,  to  raid  a  continental  power 
by  this  method  is  much  more  feasible  ;  it  is,  in  fact,  so  possible  that 
I  will  consider  it  in  some  detail. 

In  the  past  the  main  difficulty  in  harmonizing  a  combined 
naval  and  military  operation  is  closely  connected  with  movement. 

*  "History  of  the  World." 


182  The  Reformation  of  War 

A  fleet  which  possesses  command  of  the  sea  can  normally  steam 
to  any  point  on  an  enemy's  coast-line  and  effect  a  surprise  before 
the  land  forces  can  be  assembled  to  meet  it.  To-day,  this  opera- 
tion has  become  an  exceedingly  dangerous  one,  seeing  that  the 
aeroplane  can  watch  the  approach  of  the  invading  force  which, 
en  route,  may  be  attacked  by  submarines. 

On  arriving  at  the  point  selected  for  disembarkation,  the  main 
difficulty  begins.  The  ships  cannot  crawl  on  to  the  land,  and  the 
military  forces  to  be  landed  cannot  swim  to  the  shore,  and  be- 
cause of  these  limitations,  the  means  adopted  to  transfer  a  muscu- 
larly  organized  army  from  mechanically  propelled  ships  is  little 
superior  to  those  used  by  Julius  Caesar,  and  much  more  complex, 
for  his  triremes  drew  very  little  water.  The  result,  in  the  past, 
has  frequently  been  (and  as  long  as  traditional  armies  are  main- 
tained will  remain  so)  that  all  surprise  is  lost  and  that,  before  the 
army  landed  can  move  forward,  it  will  be  confronted  by  an  enemy 
in  superior  strength. 

Now  let  us  consider  a  floatable  tank  carried  in  a  submarine. 
As  the  embarkation  can  take  place  at  night,  the  initiation  of  the 
operation  will  be  secret.  As  the  machines  will  mainly  be  trans- 
ported under  the  water  their  voyage  will  be  secret.  As  their 
destination  will  alone  be  known  to  the  invader  their  landing  will 
be  secret.  From  their  floating  mechanical  base  will  be  launched 
a  floating  army.  This  force  will  propel  itself  ashore,  crawl  up  the 
beach,  and  in  place  of  converting  it  into  the  condition  of  Epsom 
Downs  on  a  Derby  morning,  will  move  straight  inland  at  a  speed 
varying  from  10  to  20  miles  the  hour.  Within  24  hours  of  landing 
it  will  be  200  miles  within  the  enemy's  country.  Freed  from 
railwa3rs,  and  let  us  suppose  possessing  one  week's  radius  of  action, 
it  will  be  able  to  terrorize  the  enemy's  people,  and  if  threatened 
by  superior  force,  it  will  generalby  be  able  to  make  for  the  coast, 
possibly  several  hundred  miles  away  from  its  original  point  of 
landing,  and  swim  out  to  the  submarines  and  re-embark. 

Let  us  now  visualize  three  or  four  such  forces  operating  at 
different  points  against  an  enemy,  and  some  picture  may  be 
formed  of  the  confusion  resulting.     Then,  let  us  suppose  that, 


The  Future  of  Sea  Warfare  183 

while  these  raiding  forces  are  disorganizing  the  enemy's  plans 
and  command,  and  demoralizing  the  civil  inhabitants,  as  the 
Vikings  disorganized  and  demoralized  half  Europe  a  thousand 
years  ago,  a  determined  invasion  is  launched  at  some  vital 
point ;  it  will  be  a  difficult  operation  for  the  enemy  to  collect 
his  disintegrated  forces  to  meet  it,  even  if  these  forces  are 
mechanical. 

The  whole  of  such  an  operation  depends  on  sea-power,  the 
only  difference,  when  compared  with  the  past,  being,  that  while 
formerly  an  army,  using  muscle  as  its  motive  force,  could  seldom 
make  good  what  the  navy  rendered  possible,  a  mechanical 
army  can  make  it  good,  it  can  take  advantage  of  a  naval  sur- 
prise and  accentuate  this  advantage  by  the  speed  with  which 
it  moves  inland. 

Think  now  what  such  possibilities  mean  to  us  islanders. 
No  longer  will  our  sailors  belong  to  the  Great  Silent  Fleet,  but 
to  a  fleet  which  belches  war  on  every  strand,  which  vomits 
forth  armies  as  never  did  the  horse  of  Troy,  and  which  will 
swallow  them  up  again,  if  the  land  appears  unpropitious,  and 
carry  them  safely  home  beneath  the  ocean. 

Think  of  the  naval  bases  seized  and  the  landing-places  pro- 
tected. Think  of  the  paralysation  of  government  and  the 
terrorization  of  mind.  Think  of  the  channel  which  separates 
us  from  Europe.  It  has  been  called  a  "  ditch  " — it  may  become 
a  veritable  tube  railway  for  hostile  armies. 

Munchausen  !  Munchausen  !  Perhaps  ;  but  do  not  let  us 
disparage  our  inventive  genius  like  a  certain  Italian  alchemist 
did  his  own  at  the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth  century.  He 
promised  to  fly  from  the  walls  of  Stirling  Castle  to  France.  He 
attempted  to  do  so  and,  falling,  broke  a  leg.  He  attributed 
his  failure  to  the  fact  that  he  used  for  his  wings  feathers  of 
fowls,  which,  he  said,  had  an  affinity  for  the  dung-hill !  It  was 
not  his  feathers  which  possessed  an  affinity  for  this  unpleasant 
heap,  but  his  brains !  He  had  been  thinking  backwards  of 
Icarus  ;  he  should  have  been  thinking  forwards  in  terms  of 
the  Wright  Brothers. 


184  The  Reformation  of  War 

Here  then  is  the  moral :  Do  not  let  us  now,  in  the  year 
1923,  continue  to  think  backwards  to  1914 ;  let  us  think  forwards 
to  1930,  1940,  1950  and  beyond,  or  we  shall  become  pillars  of 
salt  in  an  arid  and  unproductive  wilderness.  Let  us  look  ahead  ; 
the  world  is  getting  small,  but  science  is  vastly  huge.  Every 
rational  thought  is  a  true  thought  which  may  lead  to  realizable 
effect.  There  is  nothing  too  wonderful  for  science,  and  the 
fighting  services  must  grasp  the  wand  of  this  magician  and 
compel  the  future  to  obey  their  will. 

If  we  meditate  for  a  moment  on  the  above  possibilities, 
rendered  practical  by  wedding  tank  to  submarine,  two  facts 
will  strike  us  forcibly ;  these  are  : 

(i.)  The  secrecy  and  celerity  of  the  operation, 
(ii.)  The  vulnerability  of  the  civil  target. 

If  to  these  two  weapons  we  add  the  aeroplane,  this  secrecy 
and  this  vulnerability  becomes  enormously  enhanced.  Conse- 
quently, we  may  well  ask  ourselves,  as  Fontenoy  courtesies 
have  become  completely  out  of  date,  will  not  formal  declarations 
of  war  follow  suit.  Bearing  in  mind  that  the  main  tactical 
problem  in  war  is  to  hit  without  being  hit,  is  it  common-sense 
to  expect  a  nation,  reduced  to  fight  for  its  life,  a  nation  which 
possibly  possesses  scientific  weapons  of  tremendous  power,  and 
the  development  of  the  power  of  which  demands  surprise  in  its 
positive  form — an  unexpected  and  terrific  blow,  moral  or 
physical,  according  to  the  theory  of  warfare  held — to  place  its 
adversary  on  guard  by  saying  :  '  On  August  4  I  am  going  to 
hit  you."  What  is  far  more  probable  is  that  the  enemy  will 
say  nothing  at  all,  or  :  "  On  August  4  I  will  agree  to  your  terms," 
and  then  launch  a  surprise  attack  on  the  3rd.  Such  action  may 
be  proclaimed  as  immoral ;  this,  however  makes  it  none  the 
less  likely,  because  war  is  not  a  boxing  match  ;  far  from  it — it  is 
a  life  and  death  struggle.  To  say  to  a  would-be  murderer, 
"  In  five  minutes  I  am  going  to  shoot  you,"  would  be  the  act 
of  a  fool,  and,  in  the  struggle  for  national  existence,  aggressive 
nations  are  murderers  and  not  prize-fighters.     Surprise  in  its 


The  Future  of  Sea  Warfare  185 

positive  form — an  unexpected  attack — possesses  yet  another 
virtue :  it  enables  bloodshed  to  be  reduced  to  a  minimum ; 
in  fact  it  enables  a  policy  to  be  enforced  with  a  minimum  ot 
killing  or  destruction  of  property — it  is  the  true  sword  of 
victory. 

I  predict  that,  when  nations  comprehend  the  purpose  of 
war,  wars  will  not  be  declared,  and  that,  consequently,  small 
mobile  striking  forces  will  be  kept  ready,  like  fire  engines,  to 
extinguish  at  the  shortest  possible  notice  any  conflagration  which 
may  break  out.  In  Chapter  IV.,  I  showed  the  brutal  nature 
of  warfare  based  on  muscle.  In  Chapter  VII.,  I  showed 
how  liquid  gas  dropped  from  an  aeroplane  would  reduce 
slaughter.  In  Chapter  VIII.,  I  showed  that  the  tank  would 
introduce  a  reaction  towards  bloodshed,  but  that  wars  would, 
in  duration,  be  short  and  that  surprise  would  become,  more 
than  ever  it  has  been  in  the  past,  the  main  instrument  of  victory. 
In  this  Chapter  I  will  outline  yet  one  more  form  of  battle  and 
yet  one  more  war-road  to  peace. 

It  is  a  lovely  day,  not  a  cloud  in  the  sky,  as  humanity  wends 
its  daily  path  to  work,  toil  and  leisure.  Two  nations  have 
long  been  competitors  for  power  which  to-day  is  represented 
by  trade,  one  is  Great  Britain  the  other  the  Unknown.  The 
Unknown  determines  to  strike.  Its  people  know  nothing  of 
the  impending  blow,  for  they  are  all  socialists  and  consequently 
are  subjected  to  an  iron  discipline.  Less  still  do  the  inhabitants 
of  the  isle  "  set  in  the  silver  sea  "  realize  that  the  day  is  any- 
thing other  than  of  the  most  perfect.  Besides,  being  highly 
educated  democrats,  they  are  all  busily  reading  the  last  "  Girl 
Bride  Divorce,"  which  provides  a  vent  for  their  hunting 
spirit. 

The  Unknown  possesses  submarines,  tanks  and  aircraft. 
The  numerical  strength  of  which  is  immaterial,  but  what  is 
material  is  that,  relatively,  these  forces  are  superior  in  type 
to  those  in  England.  The  submarines  can  carry  six  large  tanks 
each,  the  aeroplanes  can  carry  seven  tons  of  liquid  gas  apiece, 
or  a  small   tank   of   an   equal  weight.     The  Unknown  general 


186  The  Reformation  of  War 

staff  have  studied  war.  Why  kill,  why  destroy  ?  War  is  but 
a  means  to  an  end,  the  end  is  a  more  prosperous  peace,  and 
prosperity  demands  international  co-operation,  possibly  the 
serfdom  of  one  nation  to  another,  but  it  cannot  mean  inter- 
national destruction,  for  this  is  to  turn  prosperity  upside-down. 

The  night  of  August  4  is  purple  and  azure,  and  under  the 
twinkling  stars  the  Unknown  fleets  set  out  :  some  high  in  the 
air,  some  on  the  surface  of  the  water  ready  to  dive  beneath  it 
should  necessity  demand. 

It  is  day ;  the  advanced  guard  tanks  have  descended  from 
the  air  and  proceed  at  a  steady  pace  down  the  Edgware 
Road  or  any  other  road  which  will  take  them  to  Westminster. 
They  emit  an  odourless  gas,  which  causes  the  crowd  now  gather- 
ing from  all  quarters  to  laugh  irresistibly.  Peals  of  laughter 
greet  the  tanks,  roars  of  laughter,  shrieks  of  laughter,  groans 
of  laughter,  for  to  be  unable  to  stop  laughing  at  a  tank  is  verit- 
able agony.  In  Whitehall  a  sneezing  mixture  is  emitted.  A 
policeman  on  traffic  control  sneezes  and  involuntarily  lowers 
his  hand  ;  an  elderly  lady  sneezes  and  gets  knocked  over  by  a 
motor-bus,  the  driver  of  which  sneezes  and  sneezes  again.  The 
War  Office  and  the  Admiralty  sneeze  and  cannot  stop  sneezing, 
sneezing  becomes  an  excruciating  torture.  At  the  Cenotaph 
the  Unknown  Commander  signals  "  Increase  speed,"  and  in  a 
minute  his  machines  occupy  New  and  Old  Palace  Yards  and  the 
Victoria  Tower  Gardens.  The  nozzle  of  a  hose-pipe  is  thrust 
through  a  window  of  the  House  of  Commons  and  a  tap  is  turned 
on.  The  gas  emitted  is  a  powerful  melancholic  mixed  with 
hot  air,  and,  as  the  members  breathe  it,  they  become  suicidally 
despondent.  Then  the  Unknown  Commander,  carefully  pro- 
tected by  a  gas-mask  with  a  megaphone  protruding  from  it, 
like  a  second  Cromwell,  strides  into  the  House  and  says : 

"  In  the  air  above  you  there  are  five  hundred  aeroplanes 
loaded  with  several  thousand  tons  of  a  deadly  gas.  The  garri- 
sons of  London  are  confined  to  their  barracks  by  a  stink  barrage 
which  they  are  unable  to  cross.  In  Hyde  Park  and  elsewhere 
by  three  p.m.  will  be  assembled  five  hundred  formidable  tanks. 


The  Future  of  Sea  Warfare  187 

What  can  you  do  ?     You  can  sign  this  scrap  of  paper  by  which 
you  will  agree  to  : 

(i.)  Subscribe    £500,000,000    towards    the    cost    of    building 

the  Tokio-San  Francisco  tube  railway, 
(ii.)  Remove   all   protective   duties   on   the   exports   of   the 

Unknown  nation, 
(hi.)  Sink  your  fleet  and  disband  your  army, 
(iv.)  Pull   down   your   slums   and   build   decent   houses   for 

our  socialist  brothers  in  Great  Britain, 
(v.)  Create  an  earldom  for  the  Editor  of  the  Daily  Herald, 

etc.,  etc." 

What  tomfoolery,  how  ridiculously  absurd.  Granted  ;  but 
what  can  the  Prime  Minister  do,  this  is  the  vital  question  ? 
The  five  hundred  machines  overhead  do  carry  lethal  gas  and  the 
tanks  in  Hyde  Park  are  equipped  with  thermite  shell.  If  the 
Prime  Minister  hesitates,  the  Unknown  Commander  is  quite 
man  enough  to  burn  down  or  gas  up  a  district  or  two  to  show 
him  that  he  is  in  dead  earnest.  Besides,  the  War  Office  and 
Admiralty  are  still  sneezing  and  are  helpless.  The  Prime 
Minister  signs  and  then,  with  a  sigh,  turns  to  the  masked  com- 
mander and  says :  "  What  country  do  you  represent  ?  "  The 
Unknown  bellows,  "  Eurasia,"  through  his  megaphone,  and, 
just  before  the  Prime  Minister  swoons  away  in  the  arms  of  the 
Secretary  for  War,  the  reporters  allege  that  he  murmured  : 
"  Et  tu,  Brute  !  " 

The  above  I  acknowledge  is  an  exaggeration  ;  but,  through 
years  of  contact  with  my  fellow  men,  I  have  learnt  that  it  is 
by  exaggeration  that  man's  mind  is  aroused,  for  of  the  meti- 
culously proportioned  man  takes  little  heed.  Granted  that 
it  is  a  gross  exaggeration,  then  an  exaggeration  of  what  ?  Not 
of  traditional  methods  of  war,  for  these  can  no  longer  be  exag- 
gerated, having  reached  the  very  apex  of  exaggeration  at  Verdun, 
on  the  Somme  and  at  Ypres.  In  place,  an  exaggeration  of  a 
new  type  of  warfare,  warfare  based  on  surprise  and  on  science, 
in  one  word,  on  brains  !     A  war  which  does  not  aim  at  killing 


188  The  Reformation  of  War 

and  destroying,  but  merely  at  imposing  the  will  of  one  nation 
on  another  as  economically  as  brains  can  conceive.  On  victor 
and  vanquished  alike,  because,  during  peace-time,  the  welfare 
of  both  forms  the  supports  of  the  bridge  we  call  prosperity. 
Destroy  one  support  and  the  other  is  rendered  useless  until 
the  stones  are  replaced  and  the  bridge  is  rebuilt.  Not  by 
victor  or  by  vanquished  single-handed,  but  by  both  unitedly. 
In  the  future,  wars  will  be  looked  upon  as  a  means  of  creating  a 
better  peace  and  not  as  a  means  of  bruising  a  worn-out  one. 
So  I  believe  that  a  day  will  arrive  when  wars  of  righteousness 
will  evolve  from  the  present-day  wars  of  commerce  ;  when 
nations  which  will  not  work  or  rule  for  the  benefit  of  the  world 
will  nationally  be  stamped  out  of  independence,  so  that  the 
world  may  become  a  fairer  and  a  cleaner  place  to  live  in  than  it 
has  ever  been  before. 


X 

THE   PROBLEM   OF   IMPERIAL   DEFENCE 

AS  diplomacy  is  the  art  of  maintaining  policy  by  persuasion, 
so  is  strategy  the  art  of  maintaining  policy  by  force, 
and,  as  policy  depends  on  the  ethical  and  economic  conditions 
of  the  nations,  it  is,  consequently,  changeful  in  nature,  and 
strategy,  unless  it  can  keep  pace  with  these  changes,  must  of 
necessity  become  unethical  and  uneconomic.  It  is,  therefore, 
my  intention  in  this  Chapter  to  examine  this  question,  which  not 
only  confronts  ourselves — a  far  flung  empire — but  every  inde- 
pendent country  in  the  world. 

To-day,  the  Empire  is  loaded  with  an  immense  debt  accumu- 
lated during  the  recent  war  and  is  suffering  from  acute  nervous 
unrest,  which,  in  itself,  is  not  altogether  an  unhealthy  condition, 
but  which,  at  any  moment,  may  become  so,  should  it  lead  to  a 
nervous  breakdown  ;  in  other  words  to  revolution.  Outwardly, 
the  relationship  of  the  Empire  to  foreign  powers  is  uncertain, 
for  to-day  no  balance  of  power  exists  between  the  nations  of  the 
civilized  world.  From  this  state,  if  past  history  is  to  be  relied 
upon,  we  can,  however,  with  some  certainty  predict  that  until 
the  balance  of  power  is  re-established,  and  until  one  or  more 
demented  nations  again  attempt  to  upset  it  by  grasping  at  world 
dominion,  as  Philip  II.,  Louis  XIV.,  Napoleon  I.  and  William  II. 
did,  a  great  war,  in  any  way  comparable  to  the  recent  war, 
is  unlikely.  Our  immediate  strategical  problem  is,  therefore,  not 
a  great  war  but  a  problem  of  small  wars  and  internal  security 
in  militarily  and  politically  backward  lands.  Both  these  problems 
are  primarily  problems  of  movement  and  particularly  of  movement 
in  roadless  and  railless  countries. 

189 


190  The  Reformation  of  War 

In  examining  this  problem,  I  think  it  will  simplify  our  ideas 
if  we  look  upon  movement  from  its  dimensional  aspect,  thus  : 

(i.)  One  dimensional  movement,  road,  rail  and  river, 
(ii.)  Two  dimensional  movement,  sea  and  cross-country, 
(iii.)  Three  dimensional  movement,  air  and  under-water. 

The  first  includes  the  traditional  method  of  military  movement, 
and  the  second  of  naval ;  the  third  includes  both  these  dimensions, 
but  with  this  important  difference,  namely,  that,  on  the  actual 
surface  of  the  land  or  sea  the  mobility  of  aircraft  is  not  generally 
useful. 

Bearing  in  mind  these  three  dimensions  of  movement,  our 
future  strategical  problems  are  closely  connected  with  the  pro- 
tection of  our  land  roads,  sea  roads  and  air  ways,  in  order  that 
trade  may  prosper  and,  in  event  of  it  being  threatened,  may  be 
secured  by  force.  If  we  can  guarantee  a  high  condition  of 
prosperity,  we  shall  simultaneously  attain  to  a  high  state  of 
contentedness,  which  will  mean  that  our  policy  will  possess  a 
sound  economic  and  ethical  foundation.  I  mention  this  here  as 
it  must  never  be  forgotten  that  policy  is  as  dependent  upon  strategy 
as  vice  versa. 

The  problems  of  Imperial  defence  may  be  divided  into  three 
categories — great  wars,  small  wars  and  domestic  tranquillity,  the 
objectives  of  which  are  the  maintenance  of  policy  internal  and 
external.  Each  of  these  problems  is  different  in  nature.  Thus, 
a  great  war  is  a  contest  between  highly  civilized  and  similarly 
equipped  opponents,  in  which  tactical  values  are  of  the  greatest 
importance  ;  while  a  small  war  is  normally  the  pursuit  of  an  ill- 
equipped  enemy  by  a  well-equipped  antagonist,  in  which  rapidity 
of  movement  is  the  predominant  factor  and  in  which  physical 
geography  plays  a  leading  part.  In  the  maintenance  of  law  and 
order  the  limiting  factor  is  the  law  of  the  land,  for  while  rioters 
and  rebels  are  at  liberty  to  break  it,  seeing  that  they  have  cast 
the  law  aside,  the  forces  of  the  Crown  are  not  similarly  placed, 
for,  as  their  object  is  to  reinstate  the  law,  their  actions  must  be 
within  the  law  until  such  time  as  the  rebellion  develops  into  a 


The  Problem  of  Imperial  Defence  191 

small  war,  when  the  maintenance  of  the  law  by  persuasion  is 
replaced  by  its  enforcement.  The  mere  proclaiming  of  martial 
law  in  a  disturbed  district  in  no  way  entitles  the  defence  forces 
to  cease  regarding  the  insurgents  as  citizens,  for  a  rebel,  however 
hostile,  is  not  an  alien. 

As  I  have  already  examined  the  possible  future  of  great  wars, 
in  this  Chapter  I  will  restrict  my  inquiry  and  my  suggestions  to 
small  wars  and  the  maintenance  of  domestic  peace.  Are  our 
present  means  adequate,  are  they  economical,  and,  if  not,  can 
they  be  improved  ?  These  are  the  main  questions  I  will  attempt 
to  answer,  first  of  all  inquiring  into  the  premises  of  these  two 
questions  and  then  examining  how  the  three  great  means  of 
defence — the  army,  air  force  and  navy,  can  assist  us  in  the 
solution  of  these  problems. 

(i.)  The  Small  War  Problem.  While  a  great  war  is  a  struggle 
between  organized  forces  raised  by  civilized  nations  possessing 
an  intricate  political  system  and  an  elaborate  social  organization 
which  is  easily  deranged  by  nervous  shock,  a  small  war  is  generally 
waged  against  congeries  of  tribes  or  a  loosely  organized  community 
united  by  ties  of  blood  rather  than  by  the  political  and  social 
bonds  of  civilization.  The  organization  of  such  a  society,  like 
the  organism  of  the  lower  animals,  is  controlled  by  a  series  of 
nervous  ganglia  rather  than  by  a  centralized  brain,  consequently 
the  moral  targets  are  small  and  numerous  in  place  of  being  large 
and  few  as  in  the  case  of  a  civilized  power.*  On  these  facts 
may  be  built  the  following  theory,  namely,  that  in  small  wars 
against  uncivilized  nations,  the  form  of  warfare  to  be  adopted 
must  tone  with  the  shade  of  culture  existing  in  the  land,  by 
which  I  mean  that,  against  peoples  possessing  a  low  civilization, 
war  must  be  more  brutal  in  type  (not  necessarily  in  execution) 
than  against  a  highly  civilized  nation ;  consequently,  physical 

*  Through  not  realizing  this  difference  many  curious  mistakes  have  arisen 
in  the  past,  e.g.  :  The  Graphic,  September  30,  1899  :  "  The  Strategy  of  the 
Boer  Campaign,"  by  Charles  Lowe  :  "  Once  Pretoria  is  in  possession  of  our 
troops  all  resistance  in  the  Transvaal  must  collapse,  for  the  simple  reason  that 
all  further  supply  of  war  material  to  the  Boers  must  cease."  Simple  here  is 
an  equivalent  of  silly  ! 


192  The  Reformation  of  War 

blows  are  normally  more  likely  to  prove  effective  than  nervous 
shocks.  If  this  theory  be  correct,  then  war  on  land  will  pre- 
dominate over  war  in  the  air  (moral  warfare),  as  I  shall  explain 
later  on. 

As  regards  small  wars  generally,  two  main  problems  face  us, 
the  first  is  dependent  on  time  and  space,  and  the  second  on 
organization  and  administration.  Translated  into  military  terms 
these  two  problems  are  : 

(i.)  How  are  we  going  to  secure  our  Empire  by  means  of  our 
small  army,  small  air  force  and  depleted  navy  ? 

(ii.)  How  are  we  going  to  establish  a  higher  co-operation 
than  at  present  exists  between  our  army,  navy  and  air  force  ? 

The  first  of  these  problems  I  shall  deal  with  in  this  Chapter, 
and  the  second  in  the  following  one. 

The  first  problem  is  virtually  one  of  fitting  means  to  ends. 
Our  army  is  smaller  than  it  was  in  1914,  and  yet  costs  twice  as 
much  ;  our  Empire  is  larger  than  it  was  in  1914,  and  is  in  a  very 
unsettled  and  nervous  condition.  How,  then,  are  we  to  protect 
it? 

Because  we  lack  money,  we  cannot  increase  the  size  of  the 
army  to  fit  the  Empire  ;  consequently,  there  is  only  one  thing 
which  we  can  do,  namely,  reduce  the  size  of  the  Empire  to  fit 
our  army,  and  there  are  two  ways  of  doing  this.  The  first  is 
based  on  the  factor  of  space  and  the  second  on  that  of  time. 

(a)  We  can  abandon  large  tracts  of  the  Empire  and  so  cut 
down  our  liabilities  until  they  balance  our  securities. 

(b)  We  can  increase  our  present  speed  of  military  movement 
so  that  our  securities,  through  enhanced  mobility,  may  be  brought 
to  balance  our  liabilities. 

If  we  believe  in  the  value  of  the  Empire,  then  there  can  be  no 
shadow  of  doubt  that  duty  demands  that  we  should  at  least 
attempt  the  second  solution  before  putting  into  force  the  first. 
I  will  explain  this  by  means  of  a  very  simple  example. 

Aldershot  is  thirty  miles  from  London.  An  athlete  will 
walk  this  distance  in  about  ten  hours  and  will  be  dog-tired  at 
the  end  of  it ;  a  soldier  will  take  two  days — say  thirty-six  hours  ; 


The  Problem  of  Imperial  Defence  193 

he  also  will  be  dog-tired  at  the  end  of  the  second  day.  In  place, 
I  get  into  a  Rolls-Royce  car  and  travel  to  London  in  one  hour, 
and  am  perfectly  fresh  when  I  arrive  there.  What  have  I  done  ? 
In  terms  of  time  I  have  reduced  space  by  nine-tenths  when  com- 
pared to  the  athlete  and  by  thirty-nve-thirty-sixths  when 
compared  to  the  soldier,  and  have  to  all  intents  and  purposes 
expended  no  physical  energy  in  the  process.  Fit  this  picture  to 
the  Empire,  and  suppose  that,  by  means  of  a  cross-country  tractor, 
we  only  double  the  mobility  of  the  army,  well  then,  in  terms  of 
time,  we  shall  have  halved  the  size  of  the  territories  we  are 
at  present  called  upon  to  protect.  I  will  now  turn  to  land 
protection. 

We,  as  the  inheritors  of  a  world-wide  Empire,  possess  an  all 
but  unlimited  knowledge  of  the  nature  of  small  wars  ;  we  have 
engaged  in  them  for  over  two  hundred  years,  and  throughout 
this  long  period  our  difficulties  in  winning  them  have  been  very 
similar.  Looking  back  on  the  small  wars  of  the  past,  we  find 
that  in  character  they  may  be  classified  according  to  the  topo- 
graphical nature  of  the  countries  in  which  they  most  frequently 
occur,  namely  : 

(i.)  Mountainous  land, 
(ii.)  Desert  land, 
(iii.)  Bush  land, 
(iv.)  River  land. 

Generalizing  the  main  characteristics  which  are  coincident 
with  most  small  wars,  they  are  found  to  be  as  follows  : 

(a)  A  lack  of  communications. 

(b)  A  badly  equipped  and  ill-disciplined  enemy. 

(c)  An  unhealthy  climate. 

(d)  A  lack  of  local  supplies  and  water. 

To  summarize  still  further,  it  may  ultimately  be  said  that 
small  wars  consist  in  overcoming  physical  geography  in  order  to 
chastise  unorganized  and  ill-armed  savages  or  brigands.  The 
enemy  himself  is  frequently  beneath  contempt,  but  Nature  in 
small  wars  has  hitherto  proved  herself,  as  often  as  not,  to  be 

13 


194  The  Reformation  of  War 

omnipotent ;  consequently,  the  solution  of  the  problem  is  not  to 
be  sought  in  men  or  weapons  but  in  movement.  Any  weapon 
with  which  our  men  may  be  armed  will  almost  certainly  be  superior 
to  the  enemy's  ;  but  unhindered  as  he  is  by  the  paraphernalia 
which  a  civilized  force  requires  for  its  welfare  and  subsistence, 
his  leg-power  is  frequently  so  superior  to  theirs  as  to  render 
inoperative  the  use  of  whatever  weapons  they  may  carry. 

Concerning  this  problem,  one  thing  is  certain,  and  this  is  that 
civilized  leg-power  cannot  compete  with  uncivilized,  and  through- 
out the  history  of  small  wars,  from  the  earliest  ages  to  present 
times,  the  principle  of  "  setting  a  thief  to  catch  a  thief  "  has 
frequently  been  adopted.*  When  this  has  not  been  possible, 
small  wars  have  generally  been  won  by  seizing  whatever  communi- 
cations may  exist,  by  picketing  these  and  so  denying  their  use 
to  the  enemy.  Small  wars,  even  more  so  than  great  wars,  are 
wars  of  communications.  This  being  so,  should  we  not  cease 
to  base  them  on  leg-power  and,  instead,  substitute  machine- 
power  as  typified  to-day  by  the  tank,  cross-country  tractor  and 
aeroplane  ? 

Accepting  this  suggestion  as  eventually  feasible,  if  not  im- 
mediately so,  it  is  interesting  to  deduce  the  simplifications  and 
economy  which  will  be  effected  by  the  introduction  of  machinery 
in  the  four  main  small  war  theatres — mountain,  desert,  bush  and 
river  land. 

In  mountainous  countries,  the  main  characteristics  of  past 
operations  have  been  as  follows  : 

The  dissatisfied  area  is  entered  by  one  or  more  of  the  natural 

*  E.g.,  in  1725,  four  companies  of  Highlanders  were  raised  "  for  the  protec- 
tion of  the  country  against  robbers."  In  1739,  this  number  was  increased 
to  eight  companies  and  the  whole  constituted  into  the  42nd  Royal  Highlanders. 
In  a  book  entitled,  "  A  Short  History  of  the  Highland  Regiments,"  published 
in  1743,  we  read  :  "  The  Highlander  wears  a  sort  of  thin  pump  or  brogue,  so 
light  that  it  does  not  in  the  least  impede  his  activity  in  running,  and  from  being 
constantly  accustomed  to  these  kind  of  shoes,  they  are  able  to  advance 
or  retreat  with  incredible  swiftness,  so  that  if  they  have  the  better  of  any  engage- 
ment it  is  scarcely  possible  to  escape  from  them,  and,  on  the  other  hand,  if  they 
are  overpowered,  they  soon  recover  their  hills,  where  it  is  impossible  to  reach 
them."     So  with  all  other  hill  tribes. 


The  Problem  of  Imperial  Defence  195 

avenues  of  approach,  usually  riverbeds  along  which  an  indifferent 
road  has  been  constructed.  The  force  operating  consists  of  a 
small  fighting  advanced  guard,  a  lengthy  supply  train  and  a  con- 
siderable force  of  men  to  protect  it.  This  protection  is  normally 
guaranteed  by  "  crowning  the  heights,"  that  is  by  picketing  the 
summits  of  all  positions  of  vantage  within  rifle  shot  of  the  column 
wending  its  way  along  the  valley.  This  elastic  square  of  infantry, 
which  is  drawn  round  the  supply  train,  both  by  day  and  by  night, 
at  varying  distances,  is  only  necessary  because  the  men  and 
animals  in  the  valley  are  pervious  to  bullets ;  were  they  impervious 
it  would  be  unnecessary.  This  imperviousness  can  at  once  be 
obtained  by  replacing  infantry  by  tanks  and  pack  mules  by 
bullet-proof  cross-country  tractors. 

I  will  picture  a  mechanical  punitive  expedition  operating 
against  Kabul.  The  distance  from  Peshawer  to  this  town  is 
about  150  miles.  Moving  at  four  miles  an  hour  for  eight  hours  a 
day,  Kabul  can  be  reached  in  five  days.  The  Afghans  crown  the 
heights  as  the  column  approaches,  but  gain  no  further  advantage 
than  an  unquenchable  thirst  which  sooner  or  later  will  drive  them 
once  again  back  to  the  valleys.  Road-clearing  tanks  equipped 
with  "  grabs  "  lead  the  advance  in  order  to  clear  boulders  and 
other  obstacles  from  the  road ;  bridging  tanks  follow,  then  the 
fighting  machines  and  the  supply  tractors.  Having  arrived 
at  Kabul,  the  expedition  is  supplied  by  aeroplanes,  which,  with 
impunity,  can  ferry  supplies  through  the  air  from  the  base  and 
bring  back  the  sick  and  wounded  to  the  hospitals.*  If  police 
garrisons  are  required  to  occupy  the  city  while  the  mechanical 
force  moves  on,  these  can  be  transported  by  airship  to  the 
"  bridge-head  "  established  by  the  tanks. 

No  communications  need  to  be  maintained  ;  the  whole  opera- 
tion is  really  too  simple  to  be  considered  as  partaking  of  warfare. 
Is  it  feasible  ?  No,  not  as  yet,  but  it  can  be  made  so  within  a  few 
years.  Is  it  worth  instituting  ?  Yes,  if  lives,  man-power,  money 
and  time  are  worth  economizing. 

In  desert  warfare,  what  is  the  problem  ?     Not  the  enemy,  who 

*  All  field  hospitals  will  disappear  from  the  front  and  be  relegated  to  the  base. 

13* 


196  The  Reformation  of  War 

is  armed  with  anything  from  a  matchlock  to  a  maxim,  but  water. 
Water  regulates  the  operation,  and,  as  frequently  it  will  not  drop 
from  the  clouds,  why  not  make  a  certainty  of  it  dropping  by  using 
aeroplanes  ?  In  desert  warfare,  if  the  wells  are  20  miles  apart, 
marching  becomes  difficult ;  if  40,  an  extensive  train  of  camels 
has  to  be  used.  In  1885,  Sir  H.  Stewart  took  21  days  to  cross 
from  Kortito  Gubat,*  a  distance  of  180  miles  ;  a  fast  moving  tank 
would  take  48  hours  and  an  aeroplane  only  one  and  a  half.  In 
marching  order,  a  man  carries  one  and  a  half  pints  of  water,  a 
mule  16  gallons  and  a  camel  32  gallons  ;  there  is  no  difficulty  in 
constructing  a  tank  which  will  carry  1,220  or  2,240  gallons,  or  an 
aeroplane  which  will  carry  224  to  336.  The  whole  problem  is  so 
simplified  by  machinery  that  it  again  practically  ceases  to  be 
a  question  of  warfare  at  all.  A  few  aeroplanes  would  have  saved 
Gordon,  and  El-Teb,  Maiwand,  or  Isandhlwana  could  each  have 
been  turned  into  decisive  British  victories  by  a  single  tank. 

Bush  warfare  forms  a  rather  more  intricate  problem,  as  the 
nature  of  the  country  may  frequently  be  difficult  for  roadless 
traction.  Ordinary  bush  and  scrub  land  should  prove  no  hin- 
drance even  to  existing  types  of  machines.  Dense  forest  land, 
however,  forms  a  real  obstacle,  especially  if  swamps  also  exist. 
As  we  are  so  seldom  confronted  by  this  type  of  warfare,  it  would, 
in  my  opinion,  be  uneconomical  to  attempt  to  construct  giant 
floating  machines  which  could  crash  through  the  trees  and  splash 
through  the  thick  waters. 

The  problem  in  normal  bush  warfare  is  very  similar  to  that 
already  dealt  with  in  mountain  warfare,  for  it  resolves  itself  into 
one  of  the  protection  of  the  administrative  services.  Supply 
trains  have  again  to  be  protected  by  means  of  an  elastic  square  of 
men  moving  forward  through  the  jungle,  sufficiently  far  from  the 
carriers  and  pack  animals  to  prevent  these  from  being  pelted  with 
pot  legs  and  chopped  up  telegraph  wire.  A  small  tank  needs  no 
such  protection  and  but  a  slightly  better  road  than  carriers  re- 
quire, and  its  supply  by  aeroplane  should  generally  be  feasible, 
even  if  the  country  be  covered  with  thick  bush. 

*  The  chief  difficulties  of  this  expedition  were  those  connected  with  supply. 


The  Problem  of  Imperial  Defence  197 

In  river  warfare  it  is  hardly  necessary  to  accentuate  the  pos- 
sibilities of  an  amphibious  tank.  In  the  attempted  relief  of  Kut 
during  the  Great  War,  the  supreme  difficulty  was  one  of  com- 
munications— the  command  of  the  Euphrates.  If  supply  ships 
could  have  proceeded  up  the  river,  the  garrison  would  not  only 
have  been  relieved,  but  there  is  every  probability  that  Bagdad 
would  have  been  occupied  months  before  it  was,  and  quite  pos- 
sibly the  war  shortened.  The  movement  of  the  ships  was  re- 
stricted by  gun-fire  from  the  river  banks.  If  amphibious  tanks 
could  have  been  employed,  these  would  have  preceded  the  ships, 
landed  at  suitable  points  and  turned  the  flanks  of  the  Turkish 
gunners.  As  a  matter  of  fact  good  land  machines  would  probably 
have  proved  as  useful. 

In  each  of  the  four  types  of  small  wars  examined  above,  one 
outstanding  tactical  deduction  may  be  made  if  muscle-power  is 
replaced  by  machine-power,  and  this  is  that  :  small  wars  will 
cease  directly  an  ill-armed  antagonist  is  denied  the  support  of  natural 
obstacles. 

Whatever  may  be  the  demand  for  future  great  wars,  for 
present  and  future  small  wars  motorization  is  essential.  Recently, 
a  rising  of  the  Senussi  was  quelled  by  three  armoured  cars.  Dur- 
ing the  South  African  War,  de  Wet  was  never  caught,  but  when 
at  the  beginning  of  the  last  war  he  again  took  to  horse,  he  was 
run  to  ground  by  an  armed  motor-car  in  a  few  weeks.  If  a 
wheeled  vehicle  can  do  this,  a  tracked  vehicle  can  do  several 
times  as  much;  it  can,  in  fact,  indirectly  reduce  the  size  of  our 
Empire  by  endowing  the  soldier  with  increased  power  of  move- 
ment— this  is  our  immediate  small-war  problem. 

The  problem  of  the  use  of  aircraft  in  small  wars  is  very  dif- 
ferent from  that  in  great  wars.  Moral  attack  is  localized  on  ac- 
count of  the  loose  system  of  government  which  exists  in  most 
uncivilized  lands  and  on  account  of  these  lands  possessing  a  very 
rudimentary  nervous  system — lack  of  newspapers,  telephones, 
telegraphs,  railways,  postal  service,  etc.,  all  of  which  link  indivi- 
duals into  one  corporate  nervous  organization.  Physical  attack 
is  rendered  difficult  on  account  of  natural  obstacles — mountains, 


198  The  Reformation  of  War 

forests  and  deserts,  and  on  account  of  paucity  of  fixed  communi- 
cations— roads  and  railways. 

Bearing  these  two  means  of  attack  in  mind,  I  will  examine  the 
following  small  war  difficulties  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  use  of 
aircraft. 

(i.)  Reconnaissance,  due  to  lack  of  maps  and  definite  or  fixed 

objectives, 
(ii.)  Movement,  due  to  lack  of  roads  and  innumerable  physical 

obstacles, 
(iii.)  Protection,  especially  of  lines  of  supply, 
(iv.)  Offensive  Power,  lack  of,  due  to  the  mobility  of  the 

enemy, 
(v.)  Supply,  due  to  a  lack  of  communications. 

Reconnaissance.  In  mountainous  regions  and  over  vast 
expanses  of  desert  land,  tactical  reconnaissance  by  aeroplane 
presents  many  difficulties.  Known  towns  and  villages  may  be 
visited,  but  villages  among  mountains  are  difficult  to  locate  and  in 
desert  countries  may  be  inhabited  one  day  and  abandoned  the 
next.  I  consider  it  probable,  therefore,  that  one  of  the  main 
intelligence  duties  of  aircraft  will  be  that  of  photography,  for  the 
past  has  shown  that  no  less  that  ioo  square  miles  of  country  can 
be  photographed  by  a  flight  of  from  four  to  six  aeroplanes  in  one 
day.  Such  work  as  this  must  be  of  the  utmost  value  to  the  troops 
engaged. 

Movement.  Aircraft  being  able  to  dispense  with  roads  and 
fly  over  physical  obstacles  may,  in  certain  cases,  be  able  to  trans- 
port small  garrisons  from  point  to  point.  But,  until  they  can 
land  on  very  restricted  areas  of  ground,  this  will  not  generally  be 
possible.  Their  main  duty,  in  this  respect,  will  be  to  transport 
staff  officers  from  place  to  place,  either  for  the  purpose  of  con- 
trolling military  operations  or  for  that  of  parleying  with  the  enemy 
or  with  neutral  and  friendly  tribes. 

Protection.  For  protective  work,  aircraft  will  undoubtedly  be 
of  the  utmost  use,  for  not  only  can  they  protect  the  troops  on  the 
ground  by  co-operating  with  them,  ranging  their  guns  and  re- 


The  Problem  of  Imperial  Defence  199 

porting  concentrations  of  the  enemy,  but  they  can  protect  our 
own  communications  and  attack  the  enemy's  as  they  did  those  of 
the  Turkish  Army  during  the  final  operations  in  Palestine,  in  1918. 

Offensive  Power.  Their  offensive  power,  though  local,  is 
great.  At  Kabul,  in  May,  1920,  the  single  attack  of  one  machine 
caused  extensive  damages  to  the  arsenal,  which  formed,  however, 
a  tactical  objective  not  frequently  met  with  in  small  wars.  For 
attacks  on  villages  and  positions  out  of  reach  of  the  troops,  they 
are  the  only  means  possible  ;  further,  they  can  frequently  attack 
the  economic  resources  of  the  enemy,  his  wells,  coops  and  herds, 
and  so,  on  occasion,  force  him  to  surrender. 

Supply.  I  am  of  opinion,  however,  that  the  greatest  of  the 
many  uses  to  which  aircraft  can  be  put  in  future  small  wars  is  that 
of  supply  work,  which  is,  at  present,  the  pivotal  difficulty  in  these 
operations.  At  the  siege  of  Kut  and  in  the  final  advance  on 
Aleppo  supplies  were  sent  by  air.  In  the  autumn  of  1917,  the 
German  naval  airship,  L  59,  loaded  with  supplies  and  so  con- 
structed that  her  frame  and  covering  could  be  made  use  of  by 
troops,  sailed  from  Bulgaria  to  German  East  Africa  and  though, 
through  an  error,  her  journey  was  made  in  vain,  she  nevertheless 
covered  a  distance  of  4,500  miles  in  96  hours.  Bearing  in  mind 
that  an  aeroplane  carrying  three  tons  can  feed  a  battalion  for  one 
day  and  that  an  airship  carrying  60  tons  can  feed  a  battalion  for 
three  weeks,  the  possibility  of  overcoming  the  age-long  difficulty 
of  supply  in  small  wars  becomes  manifest,  a  difficulty  which  faces 
us  to-day  in  a  more  acute  form  than  it  faced  Alexander  2,300 
years  ago. 

As  in  great  wars,  so  in  small  wars,  the  chief  hindrance  to  the 
full  use  of  aircraft  lies  not  in  the  difficulty  flying  machines  ex- 
perience in  co-operating  with  the  troops,  but  in  the  difficulty  the 
troops  experience  in  co-operating  with  aircraft.  They  can  move 
swiftly  and  bomb  fairly  accurately,  for  rifle  fire  is,  normally,  the 
only  anti-aircraft  defence  they  have  to  meet.  They  can  destroy 
wells  and  pipe-lines,  and  can  cause  local  panics,  but,  as  their  crews 
can  seldom  occupy  the  positions  attacked,  their  influence  is  transi- 
tory.    Surely  this  is  not  the  fault  of  the  aeroplane  but  of  the 


200  The  Reformation  of  War 

soldier  with  his  speed  of  two  and  a  half  miles  an  hour  and  fifteen 
miles  a  day.  If  he  will  abandon  his  legs  and  take  to  tracks  he  can 
move  at  an  average  speed  of  ten  miles  an  hour  and  one  hundred 
miles  a  day.  In  one  day  he  will  then  accomplish  what  he  can 
seldom  now  accomplish  in  ten  days,  and,  by  doing  so,  he  will  not 
only  accentuate  his  own  importance  but  he  will  enhance,  out  of 
all  present  recognition,  the  influence  of  aircraft  on  the  problems 
of  small  wars. 

Since  piracy  is,  to  all  intents  and  purposes,  a  thing  of  the  past, 
small  wars  are  restricted  to  land  operations  except  for  guerilla 
warfare  at  sea,  and  possibly,  in  the  future,  in  the  air  as  well ; 
nevertheless,  opportunities  in  small  wars  will  frequently  arise  in 
which  the  navy  can  assist  the  land  and  air  forces.  This  will  more 
particularly  be  the  case  when  an  amphibious  tank  has  been  pro- 
duced, for  then,  as  I  have  already  shown  in  Chapter  IX.,  ships  will 
virtually  be  able  to  shoot  armies  onto  the  shore ;  consequently, 
tank-carrying  vessels,  which  can  steam  at  high  speed,  are  likely 
to  become  recognized  naval  craft.  As  these  tanks,  when  once  on 
shore,  will  require  aeroplane  co-operation,  both  tactical  and  ad- 
ministrative, aeroplane-carrying  vessels  will  also  be  needed. 
With  these  two  types  of  ships  and  the  war  ships  themselves,  a 
fleet  will  become  a  completely  self-contained  fighting  force 
capable  of  operating  on  and  in  the  three  elements  of  water,  earth, 
or  air.  The  possibilities  of  such  a  force,  for  the  major  police  work 
of  the  Empire,  need  no  accentuation,  for  they  must  be  visible  to 
all. 

Still  one  more  question  confronts  the  navy,  the  type  of  vessel 
with  which  it  intends  to  picket  the  seas  and  oceans.  Hitherto, 
this  all-important  duty  has  been  carried  out  by  cruisers  ;  but  the 
naval  operations  of  the  Great  War  showed  quite  clearly  that, 
though  the  few  scattered  German  cruisers  were  able  to  do  con- 
siderable damage  to  their  enemy's  shipping,  their  life  was  a  short 
one,  because  the  German  High  Sea  Fleet  could  not  support  them. 
The  war  also  showed,  as  I  have  already  pointed  out,  that  the  only 
vessel  which  is  able  to  dispense  with  fleet  protection  is  the  sub- 
marine ;   consequently,  though  cruisers  may  still  be  used  for  out- 


The  Problem  of  Imperial  Defence  201 

post  duties,  there  can  be  little  doubt  that  ocean-going  sub- 
marines will,  in  many  cases,  be  able  to  carry  out  this  work  more 
efficiently.  I  will  now  turn  to  the  second  main  problem  of  this 
Chapter. 

(ii.)  The  Problem  of  Internal  Security.  Peacemongers,  who 
are  ever  crying  loudly  for  universal  and  total  disarmament, 
seldom  if  ever  seem  to  realize  that  domestic  peace  is  based  on 
military  force,  and  that  the  maintenance  of  domestic  peace 
is  a  more  important  problem  than  that  of  foreign  invasion. 
Disband  the  Home  Army  in  England  to-morrow,  and  either 
the  police  forces  will  have  to  be  quintupled  and  armed,  or,  at  any 
moment,  a  revolution  may  overthrow  the  government.  Revolu- 
tions have  many  causes,  but  the  immediate  cause  of  practically 
every  revolution  in  the  past  has  been  weakness  of  military 
power  to  maintain  law  and  order.  It  is  for  this  reason  that 
anarchists,  communists  and  socialists  are  ever  active  in  direct- 
ing their  energies  towards  disarmament  or  the  socialization  of 
military  power,  not  because  they  hate  war  but  because  they 
loathe  peace  and  know  full  well  that  if  the  watch-dog  of  the 
State  is  shot  or  poisoned,  they  will  be  free  for  a  space  to  plunder, 
ravish  and  burn  to  their  hearts'  content.  What  they  really 
desire  is  civil  war,  and  if  the  reader  does  not  believe  me,  then 
I  can  only  suggest  that  he  study  the  works  of  Weishaupt,  Clootz, 
Babeuf,  Fourier,  Blanc,  Proudhon,  Marx,  Bakunin  and  the 
present-day  Bolshevists — a  wilderness  of  howling  blood-intoxi- 
cated gorillas. 

The  maintenance  of  law  and  order  requires  two  forces,  one 
mobile  and  one  stable.  The  mobile  force  is  represented  by 
the  police,  who  do  not  so  much  enforce  the  law  as,  through  their 
uniforms,  express  it.  They  move  everywhere,  and,  though 
little  is  said,  they  endow  peace-lovers  with  a  confidence  in 
security  and  peace-haters  with  a  fear  of  punishment.  The  stable 
force  is  the  army,  which,  quite  rightly,  is  little  seen  in  public  ; 
nevertheless,  silently  it  stands  behind  the  police  ever  ready  to 
enforce  the  law  when  persuasion  not  to  break  it  fails  to  impress 
the  lawless. 


202  The  Reformation  of  War 

The  problem  of  internal  security,  as  concerns  the  Empire, 
may  be  examined  under  two  main  headings. 


(i.)  The  maintenance  of  law  and  order  in  civilized  countries, 
(ii.)  The    maintenance    of    law    and    order    in    undeveloped 
countries. 


The  maintenance  of  law  and  order  is  guaranteed  by  a  state 
of  peacefulness ;  consequently,  when  force  has  to  be  resorted 
to,  its  object  is  to  prevent  violence,  first,  by  the  moral  threat  of  its 
application,  and  secondly,  when  this  has  proved  useless,  by  the 
least  possible  expenditure  of  violence  compatible  with  the  re-establish- 
ment of  quietude. 

All  social  upheavals,  such  as  riots,  rebellions  and  revolutions, 
are  at  base  psychological,  they  are  like  attacks  of  intermittent 
fever,  they  give  little  public  notice  of  their  advent  and  they 
prostrate  a  district  rapidly  and  frequently  are  highly  contagious. 
In  all  these  disturbances,  there  are  two  main  difficulties  :  first, 
their  suppression  normally  demands  bloodshed  ;  and  secondly, 
it  is  difficult  to  shed  the  blood  of  the  rioters  or  rebels  without 
shedding  the  blood  of  the  innocent  as  well.  Though  in  the  past  man 
has  had  no'qualms  as  to  killing  alien  enemies,  he,  in  modern  times, 
has  shown  the  greatest  concern,  and  quite  rightly,  in  killing  the 
most  demented  of  brother  citizens.  So  much  so,  that,  through 
delaying  the  social  cupping,  society  has  on  occasion  succumbed 
through  a  rush  of  blood  to  the  brain.  The  whole  difficulty,  it  will 
be  seen,  is  one  of  killing.  First,  is  the  dog  mad,  for  otherwise  I  do 
not  want  to  shoot  him  ;  secondly,  if  I  fire,  I  shall  probably  hit  the 
old  lady  on  the  other  side  of  the  street.  But  why  kill,  why 
shoot,  why  fire  ?  Why  not  instead  use  common-sense  ?  What 
then  is  the  antidote  ? 

The  object  of  an  antidote  to  revolution,  according  to  the 
premises  I  have  laid  down,  is  the  maintenance  of  law  and  order 
without  bloodshed.  To  kill  sick  men  is  no  cure,  and  it  frequently 
exasperates  the  surviving  relatives. 


The  Problem  of  Imperial  Defence  203 

The  main  requirements  of  the  antidote  lie  in  accomplishing 
the  following  acts  without  harm  to  the  individuals  concerned  : 

(i.)  The  breaking  up  of  crowds  and  revolutionary  meetings, 
(ii.)  The  stopping  of  riots  and  acts  of  violence, 
(iii.)  The  protection  of  houses  and  public  buildings, 
(iv.)  The  isolation  of  areas  infected  by  revolution. 

The  whole  question  of  revolution  must  be  looked  upon  as 
a  social  disease  and  not  as  an  act  of  felony.  Reason  must, 
therefore,  be  exercised  and  not  anger  ;  common-sense  and  not 
violence. 

The  means  at  our  disposal  must  be  sought  for  in  the  realms 
of  chemical  sciences  and  not  in  those  of  military  law  and 
musketry.  Innocuous  gases  which  anaesthetize  crowds  or 
temporarily  blind  them,  cause  them  to  sneeze  violently,  vomit, 
go  to  sleep,  laugh  irresistibly,  or  acutely  irritate  their  abdominal 
regions,  producing  a  violent  though  harmless  distemper  of  the 
bowels,  should  be  sought  for  by  our  chemists,  who  are  far  too 
prone  to  seek  for  lethal  gases  in  place  of  those  the  effect  of 
which  is  sedative,  soporific,  mirthful,  or  comic. 

In  thinking  out  a  plan  of  action,  the  old  methods  of  violence 
must  be  banished  from  our  minds,  for  the  employment  of 
truncheons  and  rifles  only  leads  to  the  loss  of  life  among  valuable 
though  misguided  citizens,  and  frequently  among  perfectly 
innocent  people  as  well.  Besides  this,  violence  is  apt  to  in- 
flame a  crowd  and  to  glorify  its  disease  in  the  eyes  of  affected 
and  unaffected  onlookers.  Why,  then,  adopt  so  unintelligent 
a  procedure  when  a  little  gas  will  produce,  among  the  most 
truculent  sans-culottes ,  so  violent  a  distemper  that  they  will 
not  only  be  prevented  from  proceeding  with  their  nefarious  task, 
but  that  the  onlookers,  watching  them  at  a  safe  distance,  will 
be  merrily  amused  by  their  contortions.  Ridicule  is  a  potent 
weapon,  and  when  coupled  with  acute  colic,  is  apt  to  become 
irresistible.  The  redudio  ad  absurdum  method,  and  not  that 
of  lex  talionis  is  the  more  effective  in  dealing  with  revolutions 
as  with  many  other  dissatisfactions. 


204  The  Reformation  of  War 

As  to  the  methods  which  might  be  employed  in  order  to 
carry  out  the  above  requirements,  they  are  innumerable,  and 
the  following  are  merely  examples  of  what  might  be  done. 

Crowds  and  seditious  meetings,  which  are  usually  dispersed 
by  some  form  of  violence,  might  be  broken  up  by  a  simple 
sneezing  mixture.  Men  cannot  talk  and  sneeze  simultaneously, 
and  unless  they  can  talk  a  meeting  loses  its  interest.  Riots 
might  be  stopped  by  a  colic  gas  or  a  local  anaesthetic  or  some 
sedative  mixture.  Houses  and  public  buildings  could  be  pro- 
tected by  similar  means,  or  by  a  laughing  gas  which  would 
make  a  burglar  the  best  of  friends.  Dissatisfied  areas  could 
be  completely  isolated  by  a  strong  lachrymatory  solution 
sprinkled  in  the  streets  surrounding  them  by  a  tank,  which  would 
operate  as  a  tear-producing  water  cart.  Surely  such  a  method 
as  this  is  more  economical  and  reasonable  than  a  cordon  of 
hundreds  of  police.  Such,  at  least,  are  a  few  of  the  means  which 
might  be  employed,  and  certainly  they  appear  to  me  to  be  more 
common-sense  than  those  which  had  to  be  resorted  to  in  Sidney 
Street  a  few  years  ago,  when  a  powerful  force  of  police,  a  bat- 
talion of  infantry  and  a  battery  of  guns  besieged  a  single  house 
occupied  by  three  desperadoes  ! 

If  the  above  suggestions  are  worthy  of  consideration,  then 
steps  should  be  taken  to  create  an  organization  capable  of  putting 
them  into  execution  immediately  trouble  arises.  This  is  a  very 
simple  matter,  once  our  chemists  have  agreed  upon  the  means, 
for  all  that  is  necessary  is  to  issue  anti-riot  appliances  to  every 
police  and  fire  station,  and  to  hold  central  reserves  of  these 
under  military  control  in  dissatisfied  areas.  The  actual  opera- 
tors of  colic  gas,  etc.,  should  of  course  be  provided  with  respira- 
tors, or  otherwise  they  may  be  seriously  affected  before  they 
have  completed  their  patriotic  task. 

The  first  consideration  which  will  strike  the  average  English- 
man, who  is  entirely  wanting  in  imagination,  is  that  his  fellow 
countrymen  will  not  tolerate  gas  because  it  is  a  Hunnish  in- 
vention. Such  a  contention  is  not  only  untrue  but  absurd, 
for  when  social    upheavals  are  viewed  in  the  light  of  crowd 


The  Problem  of  Imperial  Defence  205 

diseases,  surely  it  is  no  more  Hunnish  to  draw,  under  the  influence 
of  gas,  the  fangs  of  a  riot  than  it  is  to  do  so  in  the  case  of  a 
patient  sitting  with  ill-favoured  teeth  in  the  dental  chair. 
Chloroform  was  discovered  by  an  eminent  Scotsman  and  not 
by  a  Hun.  To  shoot  down  a  mob  is  like  operating  on  a  patient 
without  an  anaesthetic,  and  if  the  use  of  anaesthetics  is  con- 
sidered humane  in  the  case  of  individuals,  it  is  only  common- 
sense  to  apply  them  also  to  crowds  temporarily  affected  with 
the  fever  of  rebellion.  Once  this  has  been  done,  their  leaders 
can  be  carefully  extracted  by  a  method  guaranteed  to  be 
absolutely  painless  to  the  crowd  itself,  and  the  leaders  are  not 
only  the  teeth  but  the  brains  of  every  revolution. 

Having  now  arrived  at  a  system  whereby  the  stability  of 
domestic  peace  may  be  attained  in  the  hubs  of  the  Empire — 
the  highly  civilized  centres  and  especially  in  England — I  will 
move  outwards  towards  its  circumference.  First,  let  the 
reader  never  forget  that  every  British  citizen,  according  to  the 
ethics  of  British  rule,  has  a  right  to  live,  even  when  temporarily 
demented,  and  consequently  that  law  and  order  must  be 
maintained  and  enforced  by  as  bloodless  a  process  as  possible. 
To  kill  a  man  may  destroy  the  ravages  of  disease,  but  it  is  no 
cure. 

To-day  the  police-soldier  is  armed  with  weapons  of  war, 
and  I  consider  that,  so  far  as  it  is  possible,  he  should  be  equipped 
with  weapons  which  neither  kill  nor  permanently  injure — 
what  he  requires  is  a  chemical  "  strait- jacket  "  he  can  clap 
on  the  offender.  Is  any  Imperial  benefit  gained  by  shooting 
down  several  thousand  Hindoos  in  Amritsar  or  Moplahs  in 
Madras  ?  For  the  greater  part  of  their  lives  these  unfortunate 
victims  were  useful,  law-abiding  citizens  ;  for  a  few  days  or 
weeks  they  were  demented  maniacs.  Dementia  is  not  cured 
with  the  axe. 

To-day  the  British  police-army  may  be  likened  to  a  poor 
overworked  country  doctor  who,  possessing  no  carriage  or  car, 
is  compelled  to  walk  from  patient  to  patient  in  order  to  tend 
them  as  best  he  can.     On  his  feet  he  can  manage  to  visit  about 


206  The  Reformation  of  War 

twenty  scattered  patients  in  the  course  of  a  day,  but  in  a  motor- 
car he  can  visit  forty,  and,  therefore,  it  would  appear  wise  to 
provide  him  with  one,  for  it  will  double  his  utility. 

Our  present  problem  of  the  maintenance  of  domestic  tran- 
quillity in  undeveloped  lands  is  identical  with  the  problem  of 
the  above  doctor.  Law  and  order  constitute  the  health  of  a 
people,  unrest  its  disease.  Those  who  judge  and  govern  us  are 
the  specialists,  and  our  soldiers  are  the  general  practitioners 
upon  whose  skill  the  social  health  ultimately  depends.  Some- 
times the  soldier  is  called  upon  to  perform  a  surgical  operation, 
sometimes  to  administer  an  anaesthetic,  sometimes  a  pill,  even 
a  bread  pill,  for  frequently  social  disturbances  can  be  as  easily 
cured  by  suggestion  as  bodily  ones,  for  the  origins  of  both,  as 
often  as  not,  are  imaginary.  Our  difficulty  is  not  one  of  skill 
but  of  distance,  of  time  taken  in  our  numerous  and  periodical 
visits,  for,  as  the  greater  number  of  our  patients  are  of  barbarous 
predilections,  they  live  in  most  inaccessible  places. 

To-day  our  lack  of  military  mobility  stands  out  in  truly 
remarkable  contrast  against  the  present-day  enormous  powers 
of  civil  means  of  movement.  Some  day  roads  and  railways 
will  be  built  throughout  the  Empire,  but  only  after  the  countries 
concerned  are  worthy  of  their  construction.  What  then  are 
we  to  do  ?  We  must  maintain  law  and  order  so  that  stability 
of  government  may  foster  prosperity  and  contentment.  We 
can  do  this  either  by  maintaining  an  army  of  a  million  police- 
soldiers,  costing  several  hundred  million  pounds  yearly,  which 
to-day  means  conscription  and  bankruptcy,  or  we  can  drasti- 
cally reduce  the  army  and  motorize  the  remainder. 

In  the  problem  of  domestic  peace,  it  is  again  the  tank  which 
is  the  main  factor  in  its  solution.  We  may  not  be  able  to  design 
a  machine  which  will  scale  hill-tops,  but  why  should  we  attempt 
to  scale  hill-tops  if  in  an  armoured  box  on  tracks  we  can  advance 
securely  along  the  valleys,  and  when  this  progress  is  impossible, 
walking  can  always  be  resorted  to.  The  doctor  may,  on  occa- 
sion, have  to  leave  his  car  at  the  garden  gate  and  walk  from  there 
to  the  front  door  of  his  patient's  house.     Because  of  this  his 


The  Problem  of  Imperial  Defence         207 

car  is  not  rendered  permanently  useless ;  in  internal  security 
our  problem  is  very  similar. 

And  when  he  enters  the  house  what  does  he  do  ?  He  hears 
that  the  patient  is  suffering  from  delirium  tremens  or  Ghandiitis. 
Does  he  creep  towards  the  bed  and,  when  the  maniac  is  not 
looking,  hit  him  over  the  head  with  an  axe  ?  On  the  contrary, 
he  tries  to  pacify  him,  and,  if  necessary,  straps  the  sick  man 
down  or  injects  a  does  of  morphia,  so  that  he  may  not  injure 
himself  and  others.  In  fact,  he  tackles  the  case  on  the  spot 
and  uses  common-sense. 

Normally,  the  above  work  is  carried  out  by  a  police  force 
proper,  that  is  a  force  which  is  of  the  people  it  controls,  and 
which  moves  among  them  and  which  maintains  a  state  of 
peacefulness  more  by  organizing  harmony  and  suggesting  the 
folly  of  discord  than  by  open  or  violent  compulsion.  The 
strength  of  a  police  force  lies  not  in  its  armament  but  in  the 
"  human  touch  "  it  maintains  with  the  people  generally,  both 
with  those  who  conduct  themselves  peacefully  and  those  who 
do  not ;  in  its  social  utility,  its  ubiquity  and  constant  presence 
is  its  power  based. 

In  its  essential  nature,  military  force  is  the  antithesis  of 
police  force;  consequently,  when  it  is  necessary  to  reinforce 
the  police,  it  is  equally  necessary  to  reduce  the  soldier  to  the 
footing  of  an  armed  constable  before  employing  him  as  a  fight- 
ing man,  and  it  must  be  remembered  that  a  constable  is  not  a 
fighting  man  but  a  man  who  prevents  others  fighting.  Like 
the  Grecian  heralds,  the  police  do  not  apply  the  sword,  but, 
when  two  swords  are  drawn,  they  strike  them  apart. 

The  question  now  arises,  realizing  what  police  work  entails, 
is  it  possible  for  an  air  force  to  police  a  country,  and  if  the 
answer  is  in  the  negative,  then  of  what  assistance  is  such  a  force 
to  the  existing  police  and  military  garrisons  ? 

To  begin  with,  I  believe  that  the  very  nature  of  aircraft 
is  such  as  to  preclude  the  first  suggestion,  because  mankind 
lives  on  the  earth  and  not  in  the  air ;  consequently,  in  the  air 
human-touch  is  lacking.     For  example,  we  really  cannot  say  : 


208  The  Reformation  of  War 

"  Mosul  is  a  turbulent  city ;  very  well  then,  send  fifty  bombing 
machines  there  and  blot  it  out,  obliterate  it  like  Carthage — 
man,  woman  and  child."  We  cannot  do  this,  as  it  is  really 
too  easy  to  be  practical ;  further,  we  cannot  do  it  as  we  are  no 
longer  living  in  the  days  of  Nebuchadnezzar  or  Ghengis  Khan  ; 
and  further  still,  because  the  British  Empire  has  not  been  built 
upon  obliteration  but  upon  pacification.  And  yet,  it  is  oblitera- 
tion which  air  force  officers  are  so  frequently  recommending. 
Thus  a  well-known  Wing  Commander  writes  : 

"One  object  must  be  selected — preferably  the  most  inaccessible 
village  of  the  most  prominent  tribe  which  it  is  desired  to  punish  .  .  . 
the  attack  with  bombs  and  machine  guns  must  be  relentless  and 
unremitting  and  carried  on  continuously  by  day  and  night,  on  horses, 
inhabitants,  crops  and  cattle." 

In  fact,  an  Assyrian  scourge  is  to  descend  upon  the  land 
which  completely  puts  to  blush  the  German  atrocities  of  1914. 

For  unimaginative  people  it  is  so  easy  to  be  brutal  in  the  air, 
for  they  are  out  of  touch  with  the  burning  homesteads,  the 
terror-stricken  women  and  the  maimed  children  below  them.  I  do 
not  believe  that  our  airmen  realize  this,  for  otherwise  they  would 
not  suggest  it.  Would  the  above  eminent  officer  walk  into  an 
oriental  harem  and  rip  the  women  and  children  up  with  a 
kukri  ?  He  would  not,  and  yet  he  suggests  burning  them 
alive  or  blowing  them  to  pieces.  Why  does  he  do  so  ?  The 
answer  is,  because  he  talks  like  one  in  the  air  and  not  like  one 
on  the  earth  ;    he  talks  like  an  owl  hooting  over  the  city. 

Is  then  the  air  force  useless  in  maintaining  law  and  order  ? 
Far  from  it,  if  it  be  used,  as  every  police  force  should  be  used, 
namely,  to  pacify,  and  not  to  obliterate.  In  the  air  it  is  a  con- 
stant reminder  that  force  can  be  applied,  but  I  consider  that 
it  is  not  in  this  direction  that  its  main  usefulness  is  to  be  sought, 
but  rather  in  its  ability  to  transport  political  authorities  to  and 
from  dissatisfied  areas  so  that  they  may  gain  human-touch 
with  the  causes  of  dissatisfaction  and  nip  them  in  the  bud. 
An  action,  very  similar  to  the  one  I  here  suggest,  was  carried 
out  during  the  final  stages  of  the  recent  Somaliland  operations. 


The  Problem  of  Imperial  Defence  209 

Within  forty-eight  hours  of  the  fall  of  the  Mullah's  stronghold, 
the  Governor  of  Somaliland  travelled  three  hundred  miles  in  one 
day  and  visited  the  local  chiefs,  with  the  most  satisfactory 
results.  Had  he  been  able  to  do  so  before  the  outbreak,  it  is 
quite  conceivable  that  this  particular  small  war  might  have 
been  prevented.  Further  uses  naturally  suggest  themselves, 
such  as  the  transportation  of  small  parties  of  policemen,  the 
withdrawal  of  loyal  subjects  from  dangerous  areas,  the  observa- 
tion of  disturbed  localities  and  the  breaking  up  of  hostile  meetings 
by  spraying  the  crowds  below  with  non-lethal  chemicals. 

In  the  policing  of  the  Empire  the  fleet  can  also  play  its 
part  and  an  important  one  too,  if  certain  minor  changes  are 
introduced.  Ships  in  foreign  stations  are  always  "  mobilized  "  for 
war,  and,  though  they  can  bombard  almost  any  stretch  of  coast- 
line at  short  notice,  it  is  not  through  blowing  towns  and  villages 
to  atoms  that  law  and  order  is  maintained.  The  sailor's  weak- 
ness in  police  work  lies  in  the  fact  that  he  is  not  well  equipped 
for  land  fighting.  Armed  with  a  rifle  and  bayonet  and  a  few 
machine  guns,  when  on  land  his  great  idea  is  to  trundle  about 
a  funny  little  field-piece.  The  twelve-pounder  has  its  values, 
but  they  are  incomparably  inferior  to  those  of  a  small  amphibious 
tank.  All  ships  on  outpost  work  should  carry  at  least  four 
of  these  machines  ;  then,  for  police  work,  they  can  emit  from 
them  non-toxic  chemicals,  and  for  war  work,  if  required,  bullets 
and  shells.  Suppose  that  a  rebellion  threatening  the  lives 
of  British  citizens  broke  out  at  Hong-Kong  and  there  were  no 
troops  there,  the  crew  of  our  present-day  cruiser  could  render 
small  assistance  on  land,  but,  equipped  with  four  tanks,  it 
could  make  its  presence  felt,  and  felt  in  such  a  manner  that  the 
rebellion  might  well  be  quashed  in  a  few  hours. 

To  conclude,  in  the  many  sub-problems  of  the  great  problem 
of  Imperial  defence,  the  crucial  factor  is  that  "  unity  is  strength." 
At  present  we  have  three  separate  defence  forces  and  one  objec- 
tive. We  have  an  army,  a  navy  and  an  air  force  all  striving  to 
maintain  the  integrity  of  the  Empire.  Surely  it  is  but  a  matter 
of  common-sense  to  suggest  that  if,  for  purpose  of  direction  and 

14 


210  The  Reformation  of  War 

control,  these  three  forces  could  be  amalgamated  into  one  force 
our    many    problems     would    be     simplified.      "  Simplicity,' 
Napoleon  once  said,  "  is  the  soul  of  war."     Unity  is  simplicity 
and  triplicity  is  complexity  ;  consequently,  "  Triajuncta  in  uno  " 
would    appear    to    be    the    true    objective    of    administrative 
reformation. 


XI 

THE   MEANING   OF  GRAND   STRATEGY 

THE  world  as  we  know  it  is  a  conglomerate  mass  of  relation- 
ships and  not  a  mixture  of  absolute  quantities  ;  hence 
the  impossibility  of  defining  its  terminals,  which  lie  beyond 
the  grasp  of  man's  three  dimensional  mind.  Without  the 
conception  of  space,  time  becomes  incomprehensible  and  vice 
versa.  Equally  is  good  incomprehensible  without  evil,  and  so 
also  is  peace  without  war.  Man  cannot,  in  the  absolute  sense, 
destroy  or  create,  for  all  that  he  can  do  is  to  work  and  think 
by  analogy  and  evolve  by  integration. 

When  we  talk  of  abolishing  war,  we  state  an  absurdity, 
for  nothing  can  be  abolished,  and  if  man  possessed  so  super- 
natural a  power,  the  universal  harmony,  which  is  the  balance 
between  apparent  opposites,  would  be  destroyed,  and  the 
world  as  we  know  it  would  vanish.  As  well  attempt  to  abolish 
the  centrifugal  force  of  a  whirling  planet  and  seek  to  maintain 
its  centripetal  energy  as  to  maintain  a  state  of  peacefulness 
without  war,  for  such  a  peace  would  surpass  understanding. 

The  weakness  of  the  human  mind  is  due  to  the  complexity 
of  its  surroundings.  They  are  so  mysterious  that,  in  order 
to  understand  them  at  all,  man  thinks  of  things  in  compart- 
ments. Over  the  map  of  knowledge  he  draws  dividing  lines 
and  says  this  is  black  and  that  is  white.  This  procedure  con- 
ventionally is  useful,  but  it  in  no  way  permits  us  to  imagine 
that  we  can  destroy  the  absorption  of  light  and  maintain  its 
reflection,  without  abolishing  light  itself.  So  with  war,  to 
maintain  peace  and  abolish  war  is  to  destroy  life. 

211 

14* 


212  The  Reformation  of  War 

In  the  preceding  Chapters  I  have  discussed  in  general  terms 
a  few  of  the  phases  of  war,  though  it  must  be  realized  that  its 
varieties  are  apparently  infinite  :  Wars  of  mind,  of  thought, 
of  instinct,  of  impulse,  of  sentiment,  of  words  and  of  action, 
each  possessing  a  dual  motion,  a  forward  one  engendered  by  the 
differences  of  the  extremes  in  its  nature,  and  a  recoil  or  back- 
ward movement  resulting  from  friction  between  the  forward 
movement  and  its  surroundings.  This  recoil,  in  its  turn,  possesses 
a  reaction,  and  between  action  and  reaction  is  begotten  reforma- 
tion, a  digestion  of  opposites  which  absorbs  what  existing 
circumstances  deem  profitable  and  evacuates  the  dogmas  of 
conditions  which  are  dead. 

The  soldier  does  not  only  think  of  war  as  a  compartment 
of  human  activity,  but  as  a  nest  of  pigeon-holes  :  strategy, 
tactics,  organization,  administration,  etc.,  etc.,  each  nest  being 
crammed  with  pill-boxes — infantry  tactics,  cavalry  tactics, 
artillery  tactics,  etc.,  etc.  The  danger  underlying  these  uncor- 
rected values  is  to  be  sought  in  the  temptation  to  invest  them 
with  individual,  that  is  separate,  existences,  and  then,  when 
combined  action  is  demanded,  to  produce  a  mixture  of  values 
in  place  of  a  compound. 

This  process  of  separation  leads  to  a  complete  misunder- 
standing of  the  purpose  of  analysis,  which  should  aim  at 
separating  components  so  that  their  differences  may  be  har- 
monized and  not  merely  arranged  in  various  orders.  By 
analysis  we  obtain  facts,  but  it  is  not  by  mixing  these  but  by 
an  integration  of  them  that  we  obtain  harmony.  Two  mole- 
cules of  Hydrogen  and  one  of  Oxygen  do  not  appear  as  water 
until  they  are  combined,  and  though  analysis  enables  us  to 
discover  the  elements  of  water,  synthesis  alone  enables  us  to 
unite  these  elements  so  that  they  form  water,  which,  in  nature, 
is  totally  different  from  Hydrogen  or  Oxygen. 

With  ideas  and  actions  this  synthesis  is  accomplished  through 
the  combustion  of  the  intellect,  which  can  produce  a  new 
"  substance  "  out  of  a  variety  of  old  "  substances."  In  Chapter 
II.,  I  showed  that  there  is  a  science  of  war   possessing  certain 


The  Meaning  of  Grand  Strategy  213 

elements  and  principles,  and  that  this  science  is  applicable  to 
all  forms  of  war,  since  war  cannot  exist  without  the  elements 
of  will,  weapons,  movement  and  protection.  In  that  same 
Chapter  I  also  showed  that  there  is  an  art  of  war,  and  that  this 
art  is  ever  changing.  I  do  not  propose  here  to  examine  the 
changes  which  gas,  tanks,  aeroplanes,  etc.,  will  demand  in  this 
art ;  all  I  will  state  is  that  these  changes  must  follow  well  defin- 
able lines,  those  of  increased  moral,  increased  hitting  power, 
increased  mobility  and  increased  protection.  I  will  leave  it 
to  the  reader  to  equate  the  powers  of  a  mechanical  army  with 
those  of  a  muscular  one  ;  the  changes  consequent  in  the  art 
of  war  will  then  become  apparent.  In  place,  I  intend  mounting 
as  high  as  I  am  able  the  pinnacle  of  war  and  looking  down  upon 
its  sides  in  order  to  gain  universal  perspective. 

War  may  be  compared  to  a  pyramid  possessing  a  base  and 
three  surfaces.  Its  base  is  represented  by  civil  moral  and  re- 
sources, and  its  three  surfaces,  or  sides,  by  the  land,  sea  and  air 
forces.     Our  great  work  is  to  build  this  pyramid. 

In  the  past  there  existed  a  base  and  two  sides,  an  oar-pro- 
pelled navy  and  a  leg-propelled  army ;  then  oars  gave  way  to  sails, 
and  later  on,  sails  to  steam,  and  the  edifice  of  war  became  a  very 
ramshackle  affair  since  the  divergence  between  the  two  fighting 
sides  grew  to  extremes.  Then  the  air  was  conquered  and  a  com- 
pleted pyramid  became  possible. 

To-day,  when  we  attempt  to  join  up  an  army,  navy  and  air 
force,  we  arrive  at  a  very  complex  and  unstable  organization,  for 
the  means  of  movement  of  each  force  is  different.  In  place  of 
these  different  means  of  movement — muscle,  steam  and  petrol — I 
will  suppose  that  these  means  are  oil,  petrol  and  petrol,  then 
the  differences  will  be  considerably  reduced.  As  man  lives  on 
land,  I  will  call  the  three  sides  when  built  together  a  mechanical 
defence  force,  a  force  possessing  no  separate  and  distinct  land,  air 
and  sea  force,  but  a  force  resulting  from  the  integration  of  these 
three.  At  the  base  of  the  pyramid  these  three  forces  are  at  their 
maximum  divergence,  at  its  apex  they  are  completely  united. 
Whether  an  apex  will  be  reached  I  cannot  say ;   the  top  of  the 


214  The  Reformation  of  War 

pyramid,  for  all  I  know,  may  be  truncated ;  nevertheless,  I  will 
suppose  that  an  apex  does  exist,  then  it  follows  that  the  nearer 
we  approach  this  apex  the  more  closely  will  the  natures  of  the 
three  forces  coincide,  until  eventually  they  merge  into  one. 

Whatever  period  of  war  we  may  examine,  the  base  of  this 
pyramid  is,  from  its  military  aspect,  the  moral  of  the  civil  popula- 
tion and  the  commercial  and  industrial  resources  at  their  disposal. 
This  base  gives  stability  to  the  whole  figure,  it  forms  the  fourth 
surface  uniting  the  three  above  it.  If  we  compare  the  three 
military  surfaces  to  earth,  water  and  air,  then  the  civil  will  may 
be  likened  to  fire,  the  extinguishment  of  which  in  war  is  the  object 
of  the  three  military  elements.  When  these  four  elements  are 
compounded,  a  fifth  element  emanates  from  the  compound,  the 
element  of  spirit  or  the  national  will  to  exist ;  it  is  the  driving  force 
of  all  warlike  activities.  During  peace  time  this  spirit  is  ever 
present,  and  though  its  nature,  during  war,  does  not  change,  the 
resistance  offered  to  its  progress  is  greater,  and  the  relationship 
between  this  resistance  and  the  will  to  win  gives  to  any  particular 
war  its  specific  character. 

During  peace  or  war,  our  object  is  to  conserve  and  control 
this  spirit ;  consequently,  we  must  understand  the  probable 
resistance  to  be  met  with,  for  otherwise  we  shall  not  be  able  to 
gauge  the  character  of  war,  and  not  being  able  to  gauge  the 
character  we  shall  not  know  what  type  of  warfare  will  prove  the 
most  efficient  and  economical.  This  control  and  direction  of  the 
will  to  win  and  all  the  means  whereby  this  will  may  be  expressed 
I  will  call  grand  strategy. 

Once  we  have  obtained  the  differences  between  force  and  re- 
sistance we  can  evolve  a  plan  of  action  ;  this  is  our  grand  tactics. 
The  putting  of  this  plan  into  motion  is  called  strategy,  of  which 
there  are  two  categories  :  major  strategy,  or  the  movement  of 
masses  outside  the  battlefield,  and  minor  strategy,  or  the  move- 
ment of  units  and  individuals  on  it.  From  movement  springs 
action  or  tactics,  major  tactics  dealing  with  the  actions  of  masses 
and  minor  tactics  with  those  of  units  and  individuals. 

From  the  above  it  will  be  seen  that  there  are  no  absolute 


The  Meaning  of  Grand  Strategy  215 

compartments  of  war  in  either  the  science  or  art  of  warfare. 
Analysis  enables  us  to  discover  the  elements  of  war,  inference  the 
principles  of  war,  and  observation  the  conditions  of  war.  Syn- 
thesis compounds  all  these  parts  into  one  whole,  and  the  nearer  we 
arrive  at  a  perfect  compound  the  simpler  becomes  our  task. 

Preparation  for  war  or  against  war,  from  the  grand  strategical 
aspect,  is  the  main  problem  of  peace,  just  as  the  accomplishment 
of  peaceful  prosperity  is  the  main  problem  of  war.  I  have  already 
defined  more  than  once  what  I  mean  by  the  objective  in  war,  and 
I  have  shown  that  lessons  learnt  from  the  recent  war  would  lead 
us  to  suppose  that  the  main  purpose  of  a  fleet  is  in  nature 
economic,  the  main  purpose  of  an  army  military  and  the  ma  n 
purpose  of  an  air  force  moral.  Consequently,  it  stands  to  reason, 
even  if  the  traditional  theory  of  war  prevail,  that  if,  in  the  next 
great  war,  these  three  purposes  can  be  brought  to  coincide  in  the 
objective,  that  is  meet  in  a  point,  in  place  of,  as  heretofore, 
running  on  courses  parallel  to  each  other,  the  united  strength  of 
the  defence  forces  will  be  enormously  enhanced.  There  will  then 
no  longer  be  a  naval  campaign,  a  military  campaign  and  possibly 
also  an  aerial  campaign,  all  fought  more  or  less  independently  of 
each  other,  but  one  single  campaign,  in  which  the  various  opera- 
tions will  be  coincidental. 

I  have  already  examined  the  limitations  of  the  three  fighting 
forces  and  have  shown  that  by  mechanicalizing  an  army  not  only 
can  the  tactics  of  these  three  forces  be  more  closely  correlated  but 
also  their  strategy,  that  is  the  interrelated  movements  between 
them.  The  question  now  arises,  if  in  the  art  of  war  similarity  of 
movement  can  be  established  and,  consequently,  its  categories 
synchronized,  is  it  equally  feasible  to  unify  military  science  and  so 
develop  one  science  of  war  which  will  be  equally  applicable  to 
warfare  on  land,  at  sea  and  in  the  air.  This  may  seem  an  ir- 
relevant question  to  ask,  since  it  is  well  known,  or  at  least  should 
be,  that  the  principles  of  war  are  fundamental  and,  consequently, 
are  applicable  to  all  modes  of  warfare.  In  fact,  however,  it  is  not 
irrelevant,  for,  heretofore,  the  minor  differences  in  the  art  of  war, 
arising  from  the  limitations  and  individual  characteristics  of  the 


216  The  Reformation  of  War 

forces  employed,  have  appeared  so  opposite  in  nature,  that, 
during  the  last  400  years,  a  complete  separation  has  arisen  be- 
tween the  army  and  the  navy,  a  separation  which  has  produced 
innumerable  complexities  which,  during  the  last  ten  years,  have 
been  further  confounded  b}'  the  introduction  of  a  new  mode  of 
war — air  warfare. 

Though  it  is  a  truism  to  state  that  the  basic  factor  in  war  is 
man,  it  is  not  generally  recognized  that  whether  man  fights  on 
the  land,  or  on  the  sea,  or  in  the  air,  the  elements  of  war  are  the 
same,  namely :  moral,  weapons,  movement  and  protection  ; 
consequently,  whatever  mode  of  war  is  to  be  examined,  in  these 
elements  we  find  a  common  denominator  to  all  three  forces.  If 
this  be  accepted  as  correct,  then  I  see  no  reason  why  warfare  as  a 
whole  should  not  be  treated  as  one  subject. 

Personally  I  am  of  opinion  that  the  principles  of  war, 
enumerated  in  Chapter  II.,  are  as  applicable  to  sea  warfare  and  to 
air  warfare  as  to  land  warfare,  irrespective  of  the  differences  in 
the  three  spheres  of  action  in  which  these  three  modes  of  warfare 
take  place,  the  spheres  of  sea,  air  and  land.  The  ultimate  ob- 
jective is  the  same,  namely,  the  maintenance  of  policy.  The  two 
great  means  are  the  same — offensive  and  defensive  action,  whether 
material,  physical,  or  moral.  The  methods  of  potentiating  these 
means  are  identical — concentration  and  economy,  movement  and 
surprise,  and  the  ultimate  co-ordination  is  the  same — co-operation 
within  fleets,  armies  and  air  forces  and  co-operation  between  them 
as  parts  of  one  single  defence  force.  It  is  this  co-operation  which, 
I  consider,  forms  the  foundation  of  grand  tactics,  not  as  hereto- 
fore interpreted — the  major  battle  plan  of  an  army,  or  of  a  navy, 
or  of  an  air  force,  but  of  an  army,  a  navy  and  an  air  force  inti- 
mately co-operating  in  order  to  attain  a  common  objective — the 
maintenance  of  policy. 

In  minor  tactics,  the  one  supreme  problem  which  faces  the 
fighting  man,  irrespective  of  the  service  to  which  he  belongs,  is, 
as  I  have  already  pointed  out,  "  to  give  blows  without  receiving 
them."  This  I  will  call  the  compound  of  "  secure  hitting."  In 
minor   strategy   the   basic   compound   is   "  secure   movement." 


The  Meaning  of  Grand  Strategy  217 

Upon  these  two  compounds,  which  are  derived  from  the  three 
elements  of  war — weapons,  movement  and  protection — is  the 
whole  art  of  battle  founded,  and  according  to  their  perfection  is 
the  remaining  element,  the  moral  of  the  fighting  men,  maintained. 
We  thus  see  that,  while  the  army,  navy  and  air  force  are  the  pro- 
tectors of  the  national  moral,  equally  are  weapons,  movement  and 
protection  the  shield  of  the  moral  of  the  fighting  men.  Ulti- 
mately, in  war,  the  whole  question  of  success  may  be  whittled 
down  to  one  of  security  of  moral,  which,  of  all  the  elements  of  war, 
is  the  most  unstable,  for  a  new  weapon,  a  new  means  of  movement, 
or  a  new  method  of  protection,  if  introduced  as  a  complete  sur- 
prise, may  effect  a  deroute  among  the  staunchest  of  fighting  forces. 

To  return  to  the  compound  of  secure  hitting,  which  forms  the 
corner-stone  of  minor  tactics,  the  question  now  arises  :  how  is 
this  hitting  power  to  be  applied  ?  In  an  army,  navy,  or  air  force 
individually,  security  of  hitting  demands  a  close  co-operation  of 
all  arms  in  order  to  attain  the  grand  tactical  objective — the  de- 
struction of  the  enemy's  fighting  strength.  When  these  forces 
are  combined  in  one  plan,  then,  to  the  above  co-operation  must  be 
added  a  mutual  co-operation  between  the  three  forces  themselves. 
This  co-operation,  whether  within  one  force  or  between  two  or 
three  forces,  is  virtually  the  execution  of  the  grand  tactical  plan 
of  battle  or  campaign  ;  and  it  is  important  to  remember  that  a 
plan  is  as  necessary  for  a  campaign  as  for  a  battle,  and  that,  con- 
sequently, every  battle  plan  must  form  an  economic  part  of  the 
general  plan  of  campaign.  In  Chapter  II.,  I  have  explained  that 
in  this  plan  there  are  four  grand  tactical  acts  which  may  be  carried 
out  either  separately  or  in  combination,  namely,  surprise,  attri- 
tion, envelopment  and  penetration.  Visibly  these  acts  are 
equally  applicable  to  all  modes  of  warfare — sea,  land,  or  air,  and 
whether  made  use  of  separately  or  combined,  these  acts  constitute 
the  common  denominator  of  the  plan  or  idea  of  campaign. 

The  setting  in  motion  of  this  plan  is  usually  called  strategy, 
that  is  the  secure  movement  of  troops  to  that  point  of  decision  at 
which  it  is  hoped  to  defeat  the  enemy.  In  the  past,  in  spite  of  the 
universal  nature  of  the  principles  of  war,  there  has  been  a  land 


218  The  Reformation  of  War 

strategy,  a  sea  strategy,  and  the  future  may  possibly  see  added  to 
these  two,  an  air  strategy.  This  process  of  separating  strategy 
into  three  compartments  I  believe  to  be  fundamentally  un- 
economical and  a  direct  violation  of  the  principle  of  economy  of 
forces  as  applied  to  a  united  army,  navy  and  air  force,  and  hence  a 
weakening  of  the  principle  of  the  objective.  This  separation  is 
faulty,  consequently  I  will  now  consider  the  strategy  of  all  three 
forces  as  combined. 

The  importance  of  grand  strategy  and  all  that  it  includes 
cannot  be  over-estimated  at  the  present  time,  for  in  the  whole 
course  of  history  the  necessity  for  economy  has  never  been  more 
vital ;  further,  in  its  true  meaning,  efficiency  cannot  exist  without 
it.  At  any  time  and  irrespective  of  prosperity,  a  nation  can  only 
afford  to  spend  a  certain  sum  of  money  as  an  insurance  against 
war  and  ultimately,  when  war  occurs,  as  a  safeguard  against  defeat. 
For  this  sum  to  be  economically  spent,  not  only  must  all  obsoles- 
cence be  weeded  out  of  the  defence  forces,  but  no  overlapping  can 
be  tolerated.  During  war,  nothing  is  so  uneconomical  as  im- 
provization  ;  consequently,  our  peace  strategy  must  formulate 
our  war  strategy,  by  which  I  mean  that  there  cannot  be  two 
forms  of  strategy,  one  for  peace  and  one  for  war,  without  wastage 
— moral,  physical  and  material,  when  war  breaks  out.  The  first 
duty  of  the  grand  strategist  is,  therefore,  to  appreciate  the  com- 
mercial and  financial  position  of  his  country  ;  to  discover  what  its 
resources  and  liabilities  are.  Secondly,  he  must  understand  the 
moral  characteristics  of  his  countrymen,  their  history,  pecu- 
liarities, social  customs  and  system  of  government,  for  all  these 
quantities  and  qualities  form  the  pillars  of  the  military  arch 
which  it  is  his  duty  to  construct.  Unlike  the  strategist  of  the 
past,  the  grand  strategist  of  to-day  must  no  longer  be  a  mere 
servant  of  his  ever-changing  government,  but  a  student  of  the 
permanent  characteristics  and  slowly  changing  institutions  of 
the  nation  to  which  he  belongs,  and  which  he  is  called  upon  to 
secure  against  war  and  defeat.  He  must,  in  fact,  be  a  learned 
historian  and  a  far-seeing  philosopher,  as  well  as  a  skilful  strategist 
and  tactician.     To-day  such  men  are  rare  to  come  by,  because 


The  Meaning  of  Grand  Strategy  219 

nations  understand  practically  nothing  of  the  science  of  war. 
Understanding  nothing,  there  is  no  incentive  without  or  within 
an  army  to  produce  a  breed  of  strategists  who  may  be  classed  as 
men  of  science.  In  this  respect  the  Germans  went  further  than 
all  other  nations,  and,  during  the  Great  War,  it  was  the  firmness  of 
their  grand  strategy  which  formed  the  foundation  of  their  mag- 
nificent endurance. 

The  transmission  of  power  in  all  its  forms,  in  order  to  maintain 
policy,  is  the  aim  of  grand  strategy,  its  actual  employment  being 
the  domain  of  grand  tactics.  While  strategy  is  more  particularly 
concerned  with  the  movement  of  armed  masses,  grand  strategy, 
including  these  movements,  embraces  the  motive  forces  which 
lie  behind  them  both — material  and  psychological.  From  the 
grand  strategical  point  of  view,  it  is  just  as  important  to  realize 
the  quality  of  the  moral  power  of  a  nation,  as  the  quantity  of  its 
man-power,  or  to  establish  moral  communication  by  instituting  a 
common  thought — the  will  to  win  throughout  the  nation  and  the 
fighting  services.  The  grand  strategist  we  see  is,  consequently, 
also  a  politician  and  a  diplomatist. 

While,  in  times  of  peace,  one  of  the  main  duties  of  the  grand 
strategist  is  the  movement  of  ideas  and  the  accumulation  of  moral 
energies,  his  reserves  for  war,  in  times  of  war  an  equally  im- 
portant duty  is  economically  to  release  these  terrific  forces,  which 
constitute  the  true  capital  of  the  nation,  so  that  in  the  form  of  a 
moral  explosive  they  may  impel  forward,  like  projectiles,  the 
fighting  services.  To  do  so  economically  he  must  be  in  possession 
of  a  plan  of  action,  which  cannot  be  outlined  unless  the  powers  of 
all  foreign  countries  and  their  influence  on  his  own  are  known,  for 
otherwise  he  will  not  be  in  a  position,  grand  tactically,  to  direct 
the  forces  at  his  disposal  along  the  economic  and  military  lines  of 
least  resistance  leading  towards  the  moral  reserve  of  his  antago- 
nist, the  bulk  of  which  lies  in  the  moral  of  the  civil  population.  On 
his  grand  tactics,  it  is  for  his  subordinates,  under  his  guidance, 
to  formulate  the  minor  or  battle  tactics  of  the  three  fighting  forces 
which  will  be  used  to  attack  the  enemy's  forces  physically,  econo- 
mically and  morally.     Without  a  plan,  none  of  these  things  can  be 


220  The  Reformation  of  War 

economically  accomplished ;  consequently,  we  see  that,  of  all  the 
principles  of  war,  the  principle  of  the  objective  is  the  first. 

Paradoxical  as  it  may  seem,  the  resting  time  of  the  grand 
strategist  is  during  war,  for  it  is  during  peace  that  he  works 
and  labours.  During  peace  time  he  not  only  calculates  the 
resources  in  men,  supplies  and  moral  forces  of  all  possible  enemies, 
but,  having  weighed  them,  he,  unsuspected  by  the  enemy, 
undermines  them  by  a  plan.  He  attacks  the  enemy's  man  and 
weapon  power  by  advising  his  government,  (i.)  to  enter  into  alliance 
with  other  nations,  (ii.)  to  limit  his  material  resources  by  gaining 
actual  or  fiscal  control  over  commodities  the  enemy's  country 
cannot  produce  ;  and,  according  to  their  ethics,  his  government 
attacks  the  enemy  morally  either  by  fostering  sedition  in  his 
country  or  by  winning  over  the  approval  of  the  world  by  the 
integrity  of  its  actions. 

To  war  plans  there  can  be  no  finality,  for  every  nation  is  a 
potential  enemy,  and,  as  the  policy  of  each  nation  changes,  so 
must  the  plan  change  with  it,  and  whatever  the  plan  may  be, 
the  commercial  and  moral  powers  of  the  nation  should  not  be 
squandered  or  degraded  when  it  is  put  into  force.  Finally,  the 
plan  or  plans  having  been  agreed  upon,  the  fighting  forces  should 
unitedly  be  trained  to  carry  them  out. 

From  the  above,  the  reader  will  have  gauged  that  the  grand 
strategist  is  the  unifier  of  military  action  in  all  its  forms,  and  that, 
consequently,  unity  of  command  is  the  keystone  of  the  military 
arch,  which  is  supported  on  the  civil  abutments  of  prosperity 
and  national  character.  For  one  man  to  carry  out  the  multi- 
farious duties  of  the  grand  strategist  is  manifestly  impossible, 
but  for  more  than  one  man  to  attempt  to  give  direction  to  these 
duties,  when  combined  in  a  plan  of  war,  is  manifestly  absurd. 
Ultimately,  however  vast  and  stupendous  are  the  forces  to  be 
employed,  one  man  must  direct  them,  just  as  the  brain  of  man 
directs  the  far  more  intricate  mechanism  of  the  human  body,  and 
directs  it  so  perfectly  that  the  majority  of  its  functions  are 
unconscious.  To  attempt  to  direct  an  army  by  means  of  a  council 
or  committee  is  to  seek  order  through  anarchy.     Many-headed 


The  Meaning  of  Grand  Strategy  221 

monsters  cannot  direct,  and,  like  Cerberus  or  the  Hydra,  they  fall 
victims  to  individual  initiative. 

Though  in  war,  whether  of  hundreds  or  millions,  whether 
of  a  united  nation  or  of  allied  powers,  whether  solely  on  land 
or  simultaneously  on  the  sea  and  in  the  air,  one  man  must 
direct.  This  in  no  way  prohibits  every  able  man  in  the 
country,  if  needs  be,  participating  in  the  development  of  the 
plan. 

Though,  throughout  this  book,  I  have  attempted  in  the  main 
to  examine  the  problems  of  the  future  tendencies  of  war  from 
a  general  aspect,  I  now  intend  to  examine  national  direction  in 
war  from  the  British  standpoint,  because  I  am  better  acquainted 
with  this  point  of  view  than  with  any  other,  and  have  not  the 
space  at  my  disposal  to  inquire  into  the  military  organization 
of  each  nation  in  turn. 

The  present  direction  is  as  follows  :  The  British  Empire 
is  virtually  a  commonwealth  of  free  nations  united  ethically 
under  a  constitutional  monarchy.  At  home  its  peoples  are  ruled 
by  a  representative  government,  which  is  directed  by  one  man, 
the  Prime  Minister,  assisted  by  a  cabinet  composed,  for  the  most 
part,  of  heads  of  government  departments.  As  this  cabinet 
possesses  no  military  member,  it,  at  times,  seeks  strategical  advice 
from  the  Committee  of  Imperial  Defence,  which,  theoretically, 
can  place  before  it  three  unco-ordinated  military  opinions — that 
of  the  army,  navy  and  air  force.  These  three  forces  have  no 
directing  head  or  heads,  each  being  controlled  by  a  council 
composed  of  heads  of  military,  naval,  or  air  force  departments. 

If  we  now  turn  from  the  purely  British  aspect  of  Imperial 
defence  to  that  of  the  whole  Empire,  we  shall  find  that  no  real 
system  exists  whereby  defence  can  be  co-ordinated  in  peace 
time  and  directed  in  war.  The  Committee  of  Imperial  Defence 
cannot  possibly  accomplish  this  co-ordination  since  it  is  in  no 
sense  an  Imperial  committee,  but  merely  a  defence  secretariat 
of  the  British  Cabinet,  and  an  indifferent  one  at  that,  since  its 
members  are  politicians  and  are  not  even  permanently  appointed. 
In  order  to  make  good,  to  some  extent,  its  lack  of  power,  from 


222  The  Reformation  of  War 

time  to  time,  in  the  past,  Imperial  Conferences  have  been  as- 
sembled in  London  at  which  questions  of  defence  have  been 
discussed.  As  these  Conferences  are  in  the  main  political 
assemblies,  and  as  they  only  meet  at  several  years'  interval, 
they  can  scarcely  be  considered  as  a  sufficient  means  of  co- 
ordinating the  security  of  the  Empire  ;  further  they  offer  no 
means  whatever  in  directing  Imperial  strategy  during  war 
time. 

In  considering  any  system  of  reformation,  the  first  fact  to 
bear  in  mind  is  that  the  Dominions  are  free  nations  and,  being 
young  communities,  are  rightly  very  jealous  of  their  indepen- 
dence ;  secondly,  that  every  Imperial  war  has  not  only  accen- 
tuated this  independence  but  has  increased  their  military 
responsibilities.  Their  security  is,  consequently,  becoming  more 
and  more  their  paramount  political  question ;  nevertheless,  this 
question  can  only  be  solved  by  a  close  yet  free  co-operation 
between  them  and  the  Mother  Country.  Our  problem  is,  there- 
fore, not  one  of  amalgamation  but  of  combination.  We  cannot 
possibly  hope  to  create  one  Imperial  defence  force  under  British 
control,  but  what  we  can  hope  to  do  is  to  agree  to  a  general 
reformation  of  each  existing  force  so  that,  when  war  breaks  out, 
each  force  may  be,  if  necessary,  like  the  pieces  of  a  puzzle,  rapidly 
fitted  together  to  form  one  picture.  In  order  that  this  may 
be  accomplished,  I  suggest  the  following  reformation  : 

(i.)  The  creation  of  a  permanent  Imperial  Council  divided 
into  three  great  departments. 

(a)  An  economic  department  to  consider  the  resources, 
commerce,  finance,  trade  and  industry  of  the  Empire 
as  a  whole. 

(b)  An  ethical  department  to  consider  the  psychology 
of  the  various  Dominions,  India  and  the  Colonies, 
their  customs,  traditions  and  legislation. 

(c)  A  defence  department  to  consider  the  security  of  the 
Empire  as  a  whole  and  to  suggest  the  military  policy 
for  each  part. 


The  Meaning  of  Grand  Strategy  223 

As  this  Imperial  Council  will  represent  a  League  of  British 
Nations  its  powers  can  only  be  advisory,  nevertheless  its  know- 
ledge and  prestige  will  be  so  great  that  each  separate  government 
in  the  Empire  will  be  compelled  not  only  to  listen  to  its  advice 
but  to  think  twice  before  rejecting  it. 

As  the  problem  before  me  is  a  military  one,  I  will  only  consider 
the  third  of  the  above  departments,  which  I  will  call  the  Imperial 
general  staff.  This  staff  should  consist  of  a  body  of  experts 
drawn  from  the  defence  forces  of  the  whole  Empire,  and  their 
duty  should  be  to  elaborate  a  policy  of  Imperial  defence  to  fit 
the  ethical  and  economic  conditions  as  submitted  to  them  by 
departments  (a)  and  (b). 

(ii.)  The  next  problem  is  the  execution  of  this  policy.  To- 
day, without  considering  the  Colonies  and  the  Mandatory 
territories,  we  have  three  separate  defence  forces  at  home 
and  three  in  India,  and  each  of  the  self-governing  Dominions 
has  three,  though  in  come  cases  they  are  partially  combined. 
Virtually  the  Empire  possesses  six  armies,  six  navies  and  six 
air  forces,  or  in  the  future  will  possess  them.  To  co-ordinate 
and  direct  eighteen  separate  forces,  all  of  which  overlap,  is 
indeed  a  complex  problem.  I  suggest,  therefore,  that  each 
government  should  establish  one  combined  defence  force 
under  a  Ministry  of  Defence  and  place  this  defence  force 
under  the  direction  of  one  man — a  generalissimo  or  grand 
strategist  who  will  carry  out  the  policy  of  the  Imperial 
general  staff  if  this  policy  be  accepted  by  his  govern- 
ment. 

(iii.)  In  order  to  assist  the  generalissimo  in  converting 
the  policy  into  a  grand  strategical  plan,  I  suggest  the 
creation  of  a  combined  general  staff,  that  is  a  staff  the 
members  of  which  are  drawn  from  the  army,  navy  and  air 
force. 

(iv.)  In  order  that  this  plan  may  be  put  into  rapid  execution 
and  its  direction  be  controlled,  I  am  of  opinion  that  each 
army,  navy  and  air  force   should  come  under  the  direct 


224  The  Reformation  of  War 

orders  of  a  commander-in-chief  who  will  be  in  constant 
touch  with  the  generalissimo. 

(v.)  In  order  to  assist  these  commanders-in-chief,  three 
general  staffs  should  be  established,  the  duty  of  which  will 
be  to  work  out,  in  accordance  with  the  grand  strategical 
plan,  the  grand  tactical  operations  of  their  respective 
forces. 

(vi.)  Lastly,  the  establishment  of  a  group  of  departments 
under  each  general  staff  is  necessary  in  order  to  carry  out 
the  plans  of  the  commander-in-chief  and  to  administer  to 
the  needs  of  the  services  concerned. 

I  will  now  consider,  as  briefly  as  possible,  first  the  political 
position  of  the  grand  strategist  and,  secondly,  the  main  duties 
of  a  combined  general  staff,  and,  in  the  next  Chapter,  among 
other  things,  the  organization  and  duties  of  the  general  staff 
of  an  army. 

The  grand  strategist  or  generalissimo  can  either  be  placed 
under  a  minister  of  defence  or  he  may  become  an  ex-party  war 
minister  himself,  his  position  in  the  cabinet  not  being  affected 
by  changes  of  government  but  by  tenure  of  appointment,  which, 
however,  should  be  elastic  enough  to  permit  of  an  able  man 
holding  the  appointment  for  a  number  of  years,  as  von  Moltke 
did  in  Germany,  for  rapid  changes  of  appointment  carry  with 
them  changes  of  administration. 

As  a  cabinet  minister,  the  generalissimo  will  be  able  to  keep 
himself  in  close  touch  with  the  policy  of  the  government.  The 
main  danger  of  such  an  appointment  is  that  he  may  be  persuaded 
to  meddle  with  politics,  but  this  could  be  guarded  against  by 
restricting  his  executive  powers  to  military  subjects  alone.  As  a 
cabinet  minister  his  object  should  be  to  understand  the  policy 
of  the  government  rather  than  to  influence  it,  so  that  he  may 
be  in  a  position  to  outline  to  the  combined  general  staff  the 
leading  political  factors  which  must  inevitably  influence  national 
defence,  for  without  this  knowledge  no  true  economy  can  be 
effected. 


The  Meaning  of  Grand  Strategy  225 

The  combined  general  staff  itself  should  consist  of  a  chief 
supported  by  a  small  group  of  officers  drawn  from  the  army, 
navy  and  air  force,  the  duty  of  this  staff  being  to  think  and  to 
plan.  In  order  to  assist  it  in  its  work,  two  departments,  namely, 
an  intelligence  and  a  finance  department  should  be  established 
under  it,  as  well  as  such  routine  departments  as  its  duties  may 
require.  The  intelligence  department  should  be  divided  into 
a  civil  branch  and  a  military  branch  :  the  first  comprising  legal, 
commercial,  industrial  and  scientific  sub-departments  ;  and  the 
second,  military,  naval,  aeronautical  and  geographical  sub- 
departments.  The  finance  department  should  consist  of  costing 
and  auditing  branches  for  all  three  forces. 

I  do  not  propose  here  to  enter  into  the  detail  of  the  internal 
organization  of  this  office  of  national  defence,  but  instead  I  will 
merely  outline  what  I  believe  to  be  the  main  duties  of  the  combined 
general  staff  and  its  subordinate  departments. 

The  generalissimo  will  place  before  the  combined  general 
staff  three  quantities  :  the  policy  of  the  government,  the  sum  of 
money  voted  by  Parliament  for  the  defence  forces  and  the 
direction  the  military  plan  is  to  take  in  order  to  secure  the  policy 
by  means  of  the  money  voted. 

The  combined  general  staff  will  then  analyse  the  problems 
involved,  obtaining  all  information  required  from  the  intelligence 
branch.  From  this  information  this  staff  will  first  evolve  a 
grand  strategical  plan,  then  one  or  more  grand  tactical  plans, 
and  lastly  a  series  of  instructions  based  upon  this  work.  These, 
on  completion,  will  be  handed  over  to  the  finance  department 
to  be  costed,  and  will  be  modified  if  money  is  insufficient  to  meet 
them. 

The  grand  strategical  plan  is  the  most  important,  for  on  it 
will  depend  the  respective  strengths  of  the  army,  navy  and 
air  force  and  their  geographical  distribution,  in  accordance  with 
which  the  grand  tactical  plans  will  be  formulated.  Once  agreed 
to,  the  various  grand  tactical  plans,  with  the  instructions  apper- 
taining to  them,  will  be  passed  to  the  three  commanders-in-chief, 
and,  in  order  of  priority,  will  be  worked  out  in  detail  by  their 

15 


226  The  Reformation  of  War 

general  staffs,  bulk  sums  of  money  being  credited  to  the  com- 
manders-in-chief to  pay  for  the  maintenance  of  the  troops, 
ships,  etc.,  required  to  carry  out  the  plans.  Once  the  grand 
strategy  of  the  Empire  has  been  settled,  the  plan  should  yearly  be 
amended  according  to  any  changes  in  policy  or  finance,  and 
according  to  the  innumerable  changes  in  industry,  commerce 
and  science,  at  home  and  in  foreign  nations  and  armies  ;  all  these 
changes  being  carefully  codified  by  the  intelligence  department 
and  notified  to  the  combined  general  staff. 

The  bulk  economy  which  would  be  effected  by  unifying  all 
military  effort  and  directing  it  towards  the  solution  of  one  pro- 
blem must  be  apparent  to  all  who  possess  any  knowledge  of  the 
internal  friction,  waste  of  time,  effort  and  money  of  ministries. 
These  great  spending  departments,  through  no  fault  of  their  own, 
are  forced  into  mutual  financial  competition  without  reference  to 
strategy ;  consequently,  enormous  overlapping  of  effort  takes 
place,  such  as  in  the  provision  of  supplies,  the  acquisition  of 
information  and  the  training  of  personnel.  This  is  largely  due 
to  a  lack  of  unified  direction,  which  is  the  foundation  of  all  con- 
centration of  power,  efficiency  and  economy.  In  the  new  organi- 
zation proposed,  all  these  great  spending  departments  could  be 
enormously  reduced  in  size,  and  this  reduction  would  not  only 
mean  a  financial  saving,  but  would  result  in  an  economy  of  time, 
and,  consequently,  would  lead  to  a  greater  output  of  military 
efficiency  ;  for  the  smaller  the  human  plant  the  quicker  is  the 
output  of  effort.  It  is  for  this  reason  that  every  efficient  organiza- 
tion must  ultimately  be  directed  by  one  man. 

The  question  now  arises,  how  is  this  director — the  generalis- 
simo, who  will  possess  an  unchallenged  power  of  "  Yes  "  or  "  No," 
to  be  discovered.  It  is  quite  possible,  even  probable,  that  to-day 
in  no  single  nation  does  such  a  man  exist.  Then  the  solution  to 
this  problem  is  that  he  must  be  created,  just  as  the  queen  bee  is 
developed  from  one  of  the  humble  workers  of  the  hive.  On 
mental  food  must  he  and  his  staff  be  reared,  and  this  food  must  be 
provided  at  a  War  College  of  a  type  which  to-day  does  not  exist 
in  any  country ;    for  up  to  the  present  no  country,  however 


The  Meaning  of  Grand  Strategy  227 

military  it  may  be,  has  evolved  a  science  of  war — a  true  science 
and  not  a  collection  of  maxims,  shibboleths  and  dogmas.  If  this 
is  doubted,  then  let  the  student  re-peruse  the  various  Field  Service 
Regulations  of  1914  and  ponder  over  the  events  of  the  Great  War. 

From  this  university  of  war,  as  years  pass  by,  will  be  turned 
out  a  body  of  officers  who  are  capable  of  understanding  warfare 
as  a  whole,  and  from  whom  may  be  selected  the  future  generalis- 
simo— the  grand  strategist,  the  military  director  in  peace,  and  its 
military  dictator  next  time  the  nation  is  called  upon  to  fight  for 
its  existence. 

Napoleons  are  not  born,  Napoleons  are  manufactured  from 
able  men.  Napoleon,  possessing  all  the  genius  he  did,  would  have 
been  but  a  good  general  had  he  not  simultaneously  possessed 
liberty  of  action  in  order  to  direct  his  genius  according  to  the 
necessities  of  war. 

We  want  no  Napoleons  in  peace  time,  no  military  controllers 
of  the  nation's  policy ;  the  nation  must  settle  this  itself,  for  it  is, 
in  the  light  of  our  present-day  civilization,  the  right  and  might  of 
the  people  to  do  so.  But  in  war,  when  Cosmos  is  dethroned  by 
Chaos,  when  whole  nations  grow  demented,  when  the  crowd  mind 
sways  the  multitude,,  a  nation  requires  the  man,  because  a 
study  of  the  history  of  war,  from  Cyrus  to  Marshal  Foch,  has 
proved  to  us,  by  many  a  bloody  lesson,  that  the  free  untrammelled 
director  in  war  is  the  dictator  of  victory. 

Here  then  is  an  immense  problem  which  faces  the  civilized 
world  to-day — the  problem  of  grand  strategy,  or  the  economy  of 
military  forces.  Whether  the  last  war  is  the  last  of  wars,  a  condi- 
tion which  has  never  existed  on  earth,  we  cannot  say  for  certain, 
but  we  can  hazard  that  it  is  not.  Supposing  that  this  hazard 
be  correct,  is  any  great  nation  to-day,  after  the  appalling  lessons 
of  the  last  war,  a  war  which  cost  the  world  millions  of  dead  and 
thousands  of  millions  of  money,  and  the  gloomy  repercussions  of 
which  surround  us  and  are  likely  to  continue  surrounding  us  for 
half  a  century  yet  to  come,  merely  going  to  slide  back  into  the 
complacency  of  1914  ?  A  year  which  has  long  become  a  military 
mummy,  a  thing  dead  and  wound  up  in  an  archaic  past.     Should 

15* 


228  The  Reformation  of  War 

we  not  instead  think  big  and  bigger  still,  never  being  content 
with  our  thoughts,  never  being  content  with  our  theories  or  with 
our  practices,  ever  weeding  them  through  and  costing  their  values 
in  terms  of  grand  strategy  ?  We  should,  for  discontent  with 
custom  and  prejudice  is  the  quintessence  of  mental  youth. 


XII 

THE   REFORMATION   OF   THE   ARMY 

HAVING  in  the  last  Chapter  fashioned  a  mould,  rough  though 
it  be,  wherein  may  be  modelled  the  grand  strategical  brain 
of  the  combined  defence  forces,  it  is  my  intention,  in  the  present 
Chapter,  to  attempt  to  fashion  yet  another  mould  wherein  may  be 
cast  a  new  army.  As  a  soldier,  educated  and  trained  solely  for 
war  on  land,  I  realize  that  it  would,  under  existing  conditions,  be 
considered  an  impertinence  if  I  attempted  to  create  a  mould  for 
the  navy  and  air  force  as  well.  That  I  should  be  able  to  do  so  is 
too  rational  to  be  questioned ;  consequently,  there  can  be  little 
doubt  that  my  deficiencies  in  this  respect  point  to  a  serious  lacuna 
in  the  existing  scheme  of  military  education.* 

Granted  a  grand  strategical  brain,  the  first  question  which 
arises  is  the  economical  expenditure  of  its  energy.  Energy 
means  action,  and  as  misdirected  action  means  loss  of  power,  I 
will  first  make  certain  of  the  premises  upon  which  I  intend  to 
base  my  military  reformation. 

The  Great  War  of  1914-1918,  as  I  hope  I  have  clearly  shown, 
opened  a  new  epoch  in  military  history,  the  epoch  of  scientific 
warfare,  the  two  leading  inventions  being  gas  and  tanks. 

There  can  be  no  disputing  it  that  this  war  proved  : 

(i.)  That  large  conscript  armies,  based  on  muscle-power,  have 
two  fundamental  defects  :  extreme  vulnerability  due  to  super- 
ficial area  ;  extreme  immobility  due  to  bulk.  The  first  neces- 
sitates the  seeking  of  underground  protection,  which  increases  the 

*  In  my  opinion  the  reformation  of  the  navy  and  air  force  can  be  carried 
out  on  approximately  the  same  lines  as  laid  down  in  this  Chapter;  consequently, 
a  combination  of  certain  training  establishments,  etc.,  is  possible.  This  alone 
demands  the  establishment  of  a  combined  general  staff  to  carry  it  out. 

229 


230  The  Reformation  of  War 

second,  which  is  further  accentuated  by  armies  being  tied  down  to 
roads  and  railways  for  their  supply. 

(ii.)  That  the  petrol  engine  has  not  only  reduced  the  human 
target  by  enabling  few  men  to  do  what  many  were  required  for, 
and  by  enabling  above-ground  and  mobile  direct  protection  to  be 
introduced  (with  the  result  that  wastage  of  man-power  is  lessened), 
but  that  roads  may  be  dispensed  with  and  mobility  of  manoeuvre 
and  supply  increased. 

The  fundamental  fact  to  be  deduced  from  these  premises  is 
that  mobility,  carrying  with  it  enhanced  offensive  and  defensive 
power,  and  not  numbers,  is  the  line  of  economic  direction  along 
which  future  preparation,  that  is  the  remodelling  of  the  army, 
should  proceed. 

The  object  of  the  military  forces  of  the  Empire,  as  I  have  re- 
peated again  and  again,  is  to  secure  Imperial  stability,  conse- 
quently the  army  must  not  be  looked  upon  simply  as  a  means  of 
limiting  the  ravages  of  war,  but  as  an  instrument  which  will  prevent 
war  occurring. 

Based  on  this  objective,  the  remodelling  of  the  existing  forces 
should  create,  within  the  limits  of  the  money  available,  a  military 
organization  of  the  highest  efficiency  and  with  powers  of  efficient 
development  along  the  economic  line.  Under  existing  conditions 
the  purposes  of  the  army,  in  order  of  precedence,  are  : 

(i.)  The  maintenance  of  the  integrity  of  the  Empire  from 
internal  disruption. 

(ii.)  The  security  of  the  Empire  from  external  policy  and 
foreign  invasion. 

(hi.)  The  power  of  producing  in  a  great  war  the  most  potent 
scientific  weapon,  within  the  limits  of  money,  that  it  is  possible  to 
create. 

The  means  at  our  disposal  are  our  existing  forces,  which  form 
a  conglomerate  and  incoherent  mass,  not  only  of  separate  arms, 
but  also  of  similar  arms  in  various  categories  of  efficiency.  Our 
present  army  is  a  monster  carrying  with  it  all  kinds  of  rudimentary 
organs  and  ever  sprouting  new  horn3. 

To  refashion  this  Hydra,  rational  military  thought  is  required  ; 


The  Reformation  of  the  Army  231 

consequently,  however  perfect  may  be  the  grand  strategical 
brain,  the  military  spinal  cord  must  also  be  efficient.  I  will  now 
consider  this  sub-brain  or  ganglion. 

The  most  perfect  organization  which  exists  in  this  world  is  the 
body  of  man,  at  the  summit  of  which  is  to  be  found  a  directing 
organ — the  brains,  securely  ensconced  in  a  bone  box  and  kept 
warm  by  a  mat  of  hair.  In  an  army,  this  organ  is  represented  by 
the  commander  (the  deciding  will)  and  his  staff  (the  assisting 
faculties).  Before  the  Great  War,  our  general  staff  officers 
worked  but  did  not  think  scientifically.  They  were  slaves  of  the 
past  in  place  of  being  masters  of  the  future.  Had  the  general 
staff,  in  1913,  been  a  true  brain,  they  could  not  have  argued  for  a 
whole  year  about  the  trajectory  of  a  rifle  and  failed  to  equip  in- 
fantry battalions  with  more  than  two  machine  guns.*  Had  they 
thought  deeply  on  the  most  important  tactical  problem  in  war 
"  how  to  give  blows  without  receiving  them,"  we  should  have  had 
tanks  twenty  or  more  years  ago.  Had  they  even  been  liberal  in 
judgment  and  open-minded,  they  would  not  have  paid  such  little 
consideration  to  so  many  of  the  new  inventions  the  war  eventually 
proved  essential.  The  general  staff  were  and,  in  many  respects, 
still  are  monastic  in  mind.  They  accept  dogmas  which  bear  but 
an  antiquated  relationship  to  truth  and  repeat  rituals  which  be- 
long to  a  dead  epoch.  They  do  so  not  because  they  lack  ability 
and  brain-power,  but  because  their  ability  and  brain-power  are 
swamped  by  routine  and  lack  the  direction  of  a  commander-in- 
chief,  a  thinking  head  who,  working  under  the  generalissimo  of  the 
combined  general  staff,  will  be  in  a  position  to  vivify  the  whole 
nervous  system  of  the  army. 

Granted  an  efficient  commander-in-chief,  the  next  question 
which  arises  is  :   how  should  his  staff  be  organized  ? 

What  has  it  to  administer  ?     An  army  !     An  army,   as   I 


*  In  the  autumn  of  1913,  as  a  brigade  machine-gun  officer,  I  was  so  convinced 
that  an  increase  in  machine  guns  was  necessary  that  I  suggested  officially 
that  each  battalion  should  be  provided  with  eight,  and  that  each  infantry 
brigade  should  possess  a  company  of  eight  guns.  I  was  informed  that  this  was 
impossible  as  it  would  mean  "  a  reduction  in  the  number  of  bayonets." 


232  The  Reformation  of  War 

have  shown  in  Chapter  II.,  is  a  compound  of  certain  elements ; 
therefore  I  will  think  in  terms  of  these. 

He  and  his  staff  must  think  in  terms  of  men,  protection, 
weapons  and  movement.  This  gives  us  four  departments  of  the 
staff. 

Department  A  {Men)  to  deal  with  recruiting,  moral,  discipline 
(rewards  and  punishments),  health  and  mobilization. 

Department  B  [Protection)  to  deal  with  housing,  feeding, 
clothing,  ammunition  and  lands. 

Department  C  {Weapons)  to  deal  with  research,  design,  experi- 
ment, production  and  repairs. 

Department  D  {Movement)  to  deal  with  the  organization  of 
road,  rail,  water,  cross-country  and  air  movement. 

As  protection  is  a  tactical  word,  I  will  substitute  for  it 
"  supply,"  and  in  this  there  is  nothing  illogical,  supply  being  the 
stable,  that  is  protective,  base  of  all  military  organization. 

As  the  elements  have  to  be  compounded  before  they  become  of 
practical  value,  and  as  this  compound  has  to  be  paid  for,  to  the 
above  departments  must  be  added  two  others  : 

Department  E  {Operations)  to  deal  with  intelligence,  planning, 
organization  and  training. 

Department  F  {Finance)  to  deal  with  costing,  auditing  and 
accounting. 

Such  are  the  six  great  departments  of  the  staff,  and,  outwardly, 
they  do  not  differ  very  much  from  the  present  Adjutant-General's, 
Quartermaster-General's,  Master-General  of  the  Ordnance's, 
General  Staff  and  Financial  Departments,  except  that  a  separate 
department  for  Movement  has  been  added.  Now  I  come  to  the 
keystone  which  is  at  present  lacking  in  the  military  arch.  All 
these  branches  of  the  staff  are  separate  unities  unless  a  co- 
ordinating body  is  placed  over  them.  This  body  I  will  call  the 
general  staff,  because  it  is  general  and  not,  as  at  present,  special 
and  particular ;  it  should  be  placed  under  a  chief  general  staff 
officer,  the  right-hand  man  of  the  commander-in-chief.  Before 
examining  its  duties,  I  will  first  outline  the  general  organization 
of  the  departments  of  the  staff  which  it  controls. 


The  Reformation  of  the  Army  233 

Each  department  should  be  organized  in  three  sections  : 

(i.)  A  thinking  section. 
(ii.)  A  liaison  section, 
(iii.)  A  routine  section. 

The  thinking  section  should  form  the  brains  of  its  department, 
and,  working  on  the  orders  of  the  general  staff,  should  apply  the 
policy  (principles)  received  according  to  existing  circumstances 
(conditions).  The  liaison  section  (senses)  should  watch  the 
application  of  this  policy,  criticize  the  work  of  the  army  (muscles) 
and  keep  the  thinking  section  alive  to  local  and  changing  con- 
ditions. The  routine  section  (nerves  and  system  of  circulation) 
should  deal  with  all  matters  of  routine,  renovate  and  clear  the 
whole  department  of  waste  products  and  constitute  the  channel 
of  correspondence. 

In  order  that  logical  thought  may  be  established,  each  thinking 
section  should  be  organized  in  three  sub-sections  : 

(i.)  A  historical  sub-section  to  draw  deductions  from  the  past, 
(ii.)  An  economic  sub-section  to  evaluate  the  present, 
(iii.)  A  planning  sub-section  to  shape  these  deductions  and 
values  to  the  future. 

Now  I  will  return  to  the  general  staff,  which  should  be  similarly 
organized.  Its  duties  are  to  convert  the  policy  received  from 
the  combined  general  staff  into  a  military  plan  ;  it,  consequently, 
must  be  in  the  closest  touch  with  the  combined  general  staff,  and, 
in  order  to  co-ordinate  and  systematize  its  work,  it  must  also  be 
in  close  touch  with  the  various  thinking  sections  of  the  depart- 
ments of  the  staff.  It  should  look  at  the  army  as  a  whole  and, 
when  necessary,  reduce  the  thought  of  the  various  thinking 
sections  to  book  form  for  the  instruction  of  the  army.  The 
present  system  of  producing  manuals  written  by  specialists, 
soused  in  one  idea,  does  not  tend  towards  efficient  co-operation 
between  the  arms,  and  is  apt  to  lead  to  military  pedantry  and 
tactical  bunions. 


234 


The  Reformation  of  War 


A  question  of  the  highest  present  importance  is  the  organiza- 
tion of  Department  C,  for  it  constitutes  the  weapon-producing 
department  of  the  New  Model  Army.  The  personnel  will  have 
to  be  a  mixture  of  civilians  and  soldiers,  and  these  will  have  to 
work  in  the  closest  liaison  with  civil  scientists.  Besides  the 
general  organization  outlined  above,  its  creative  duties  should 
be  subdivided  as  in  the  diagram. 


Headquarters  C  Department. 


1 

Research. 

tc 

in 
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Xi 

O 

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Design. 


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p 

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The  general  scheme  of  its  duties  should  be  as  follows  : 
Under   its   Headquarters   should   be   established   three   sub- 


The  Reformation  of  the  Army  235 

departments — Research,  Design  and  Experiment,  which  can  either 
deal  with  their  respective  subjects  directly  or  through  civil 
firms.  The  research  sub-department  should  be  divided  according 
to  the  sciences,  and  the  remaining  two  according  to  the  weapons, 
machines,  etc.,  the  army  will  require.  For  example,  the  general 
staff  considers  that  a  Mark  X  machine  gun  is  needed.  It  forwards 
these  requirements  to  Headquarters  C  Department,  which  consults 
Research,  if  research  work  is  required,  and  eventually  passes 
them  on  to  Design.  Design  reduces  these  requirements  to 
specifications  and  drawings  and  forwards  these  to  Experiment. 
Experiment  produces  Mark  X  up  to  specification  or  refers  it 
back  to  Design  if  it  cannot  do  so.  Once  the  new  weapon  is 
produced,  the  next  step  is  to  test  it  out,  i.e.,  the  weapon  must 
be  made  "  fool-proof  "  and  "  campaign  worthy."  Experts  are 
too  skilled  to  carry  out  this  work,  consequently,  Mark  X  is  sent 
to  the  school  dealing  with  machine  guns  and  put  through  ex- 
haustive trials.  This  school  reports  on  its  suitability  through 
Department  E  to  the  general  staff,  which  accepts  Mark  X  or 
refers  it  to  Department  C  for  improvement  or  alteration. 

Though,  in  practice,  the  procedure  cannot  be  so  completely 
cut  and  dried  as  the  above,  and  in  many  cases  civil  firms  will 
have  to  carry  out  the  work,  the  process  outlined  guarantees 
that  all  new  weapons  are  attuned  to  the  limitations  of  the  private 
soldier  and  that  their  inter-relationship  is  co-ordinated,  as  they 
all  originate  from  one  brain — the  general  staff. 

From  the  above  it  will  be  seen  that  the  responsibilities  of  the 
general  staff  are  considerable,  and,  in  my  own  opinion,  the  type 
of  officer  required  for  this  work  scarcely  exists  to-day.  In  the 
past  the  general  staff  have  dealt  chiefly  with  military  metaphysics, 
and  if  the  nature  of  future  warfare  as  outlined  in  this  book  is 
considered  probable,  then  the  general  staff  officer  will  have  to 
deal  very  largely  with  military  mechanics.  He  will  have  to 
study  modern  engineering  journals  and  the  old  prints  of  hundreds 
of  years  ago  depicting  flame-projectors  and  gas  bombs  ;  these 
will  set  vibrating  "  brain-waves,"  which  will  awaken  new  design. 
He  will  have  to  study  the  evolution  of  weapons  from  the  sarissa 


236  The  Reformation  of  War 

to  the  aerial  torpedo.  In  fact,  he  must  become  an  adept  in  war- 
tool  biology. 

The  present  Staff  Colleges  do  not  permit  of  the  training  of 
such  officers.  In  1914  their  teaching  was,  from  the  point  of  view 
of  scientific  warfare,  antiquated.  They  were  routine  schools 
looking  back  on  past  wars,  with  scarcely  a  glance  at  the  future. 
What  is  required  is  a  total  revision  of  their  military  outlook. 
They  must  be  brought  to  visualize  that  the  past  is  only  a  road 
to  the  future,  that  to-day  the  epoch  of  all  former  wars,  an  epoch 
based  on  muscular  force,  is  rapidly  closing  down,  and  that  a  new 
epoch,  based  on  mechanical  energy,  is  rapidly  opening  up. 
Consequently,  that,  in  a  few  years  time,  the  army  of  1914 
will  be  as  obsolete  as  the  army  of  1814  and  far  more  expen- 
sive. 

Unless  we  have  commanders  and  staft  officers  who  can  grasp 
this  and  all  that  it  portends,  we,  a  generation  hence,  shall  be 
fighting  battles  with  an  army  of  t.hree-deckers  in  place  of  an  army 
of  battle  cruisers  ;  meanwhile  the  commercial  loss  will  be  appalling 
and  our  political  stability  the  weathercock  of  every  international 
breeze. 

In  order  to  establish  a  new  creed  of  war  we  require  a  new 
military  testament.  I  ask  the  reader  to  look  back  and  examine 
our  pre-war  training  manuals.  What  will  he  see  ?  A  tangle 
of  valuable  information  wanting  in  logical  reference  or  simplicity 
of  relationship  and  dull  beyond  belief.  On  what  central  idea 
should  the  new  testament  of  war  be  written  ?  On  the  idea  of 
men  and  not  on  that  of  weapons,  for  it  is  men  who  read  books 
and  not  guns  and  rifles,  and  men,  being  living  beings,  require 
"  live "  books,  not  compendium^  of  uncompromising  dullness 
and  polished  platitudes. 

As  regards  men,  as  soldiers,  there  are  four  main  types  :  com- 
manders, leaders,  led  and  administrators ;  consequently,  the 
new  testament  of  military  knowledge  must  follow  suit. 

(i.)  Books  for  Commanders.     A  manual  on  "  The  Science  and 
Art  of  War,"  deduced  from  an  analytical  study  of  the 


The  Reformation  of  the  Army  237 

history  of  war,  and  a  manual  on  "  The  Science  and  Art  of 
Military  Training,"  based  on  the  principles  laid  down  in 
the  first  manual. 

(ii.)  Books  for  Leaders.  A  manual  on  "  Combined  Tactics," 
and  another  on  "  Combined  Training,"  based  on  the  two 
former  works  for  commanders. 

(iii.)  Books  for  the  Led.  On  the  general  knowledge  contained 
in  "Combined  Tactics"  and  "Combined  Training,"  a 
"  Battle  and  Training  Manual  "  should  be  written  for  each 
arm. 

(iv.)  Books  for  the  Staff.  A  manual  on  the  "  Economics  of 
Administration "  and  another  on  the  "  Psychology  of 
Administration."  In  these  two  books  should  be  included 
all  staff  duties  from  those  of  an  adjutant  upwards. 

The  above  list  is  not  formidable,  but  once  again  it  is  quality 
and  not  quantity  which  is  required — quality  set  forth  logically 
and  humanly,  for  man,  being  human,  will  not  read  dull  books 
when  instead  he  can  read  "  live  "  newspapers. 

Having  now  provided  a  mould  for  the  remodelling  of  the  spinal 
cord  of  the  army,  I  will  turn  to  the  muscles  of  the  new  military 
organization.  I  have  written  enough  to  render  it  needless  to 
prove  again  that  the  entire  tendencies  of  military  evolution  are 
directed  towards  the  replacement  of  muscle-power  by  machine- 
power.  Mechanical  movement,  consequently,  is  our  pivot  of 
reformation. 

This  reformation  must  of  necessity  be  a  slow  one  and,  before  it 
can  be  begun,  a  period  of  experimental  work  will  have  to  be 
undergone  ;  consequently,  every  army  to-day  requires  a  military 
laboratory,  an  experimental  formation  large  enough  to  include 
all  existing  arms. 

In  1803,  through  the  wisdom  of  the  Duke  of  York,  an  experi- 
mental brigade  was  established  at  Shorncliffe  under  the  command 
of  one  of  the  most  able  and  humane  officers  in  the  British  Army 
— Major-General  Sir  John  Moore.  The  work  carried  out  at  this 
camp  had  a  stupendous  influence  on  the  Napoleonic  wars,  for 


238  The  Reformation  of  War 

by  degrees  the  tactics  evolved  were  adopted  by  Wellington,  and 
by  means  of  these  tactics  did  he  beat  the  French  wherever 
he  met  them.  On  the  fifty-third  anniversary  of  the  battle 
of  Waterloo,  Colonel  Gawler  (52nd  Light  Infantry),  who  had 
seen  in  the  field,  between  1810  and  1815,  the  practical  working 
of  the  Shorncliffe  training,  wrote  to  his  son  : 

"  With  this  system  (Sir  John  Moore's),  the  old  Duke  out-manoeuvred 
every  army  opposed  to  him,  and  never  lost  a  battle.  To  the  very 
end  of  the  day  (Waterloo),  we  manoeuvred  by  well- formed  battalions, 
as  smoothly  and  as  rapidly  as  we  should  have  done  on  Southsea 
Common.  While  from  the  beginning  of  the  day  French  elan,  like  soda 
water,  had  to  be  corked  up  in  masses.  The  moment  the  density  was 
rudely  broken,  all  went  off  in  smoke  and  confusion."* 

To-day  every  civilized  army  requires  such  a  brigade  as 
Sir  John  Moore's,  a  military  laboratory  wherein  to  test  the  new 
against  the  old  ;  but  as  a  laboratory,  however  well  equipped, 
is  useless  without  a  skilled  chemist,  so  also  is  an  experimental 
brigade  useless  without  a  John  Moore.  Further,  as  the  chemist 
within  certain  financial  limitations,  must  be  given  a  free  hand 
to  carry  out  his  experiments,  and  as  he  cannot  do  so  if  the 
whole  of  his  appliances  are  changed  at  short  intervals,  so  must 
the  commander  of  the  experimental  brigade  be  given  a  free 
hand,  and  so  also  must  his  brigade  be  a  permanent  one,  his 
men  and  means  changing  as  little  as  possible. 

Granted  the  above  mechanism  of  research  and  granted 
that  reformation  is  to  pivot  on  the  internal  combustion  engine, 
then  the  object  of  an  experimental  brigade  is  in  nature  a  dual 
one  : 

(i.)  To  test  out  the  existing  organization. 

(ii.)  To  test  out  the  theories  of  cross-country  movement. 

This  work  will  enable  us  : 

(i.)  To  discover  the  tactical  and  administrative  influences  of 
the  new  arms  on  the  old. 

*  "  The  Oxfordshire  Light  Infantry  Chronicle,"   1901,  p.  162. 


The  Reformation  of  the  Army  239 

(ii.)  To  work  out  the  proportions  of  the  new  arms  to  the  old. 

(iii.)  To  set  together  these  proportions  in  a  definite  organiza- 
tion. 

(iv.)  To  discover  the  time  necessary  wherein  to  train  the 
new  organization. 

(v.)  To  enable  us  to  estimate  the  cost  of  the  new  organiza- 
tion, not  only  in  terms  of  money  but  in  terms  of  increased 
efficiency. 

In  my  opinion  it  is  very  necessary  to  separate  idea  from 
action,  that  is  theory  from  practice,  for  idea  should  be  the 
product  of  the  study  and  not  of  the  laboratory.  Consequently, 
idea  should  be  evolved  outside  the  brigade,  and,  as  ideas  will 
affect  the  whole  of  the  defence  forces,  they  should  of  necessity 
be  originated  by  the  combined  general  staff.  Once  originated, 
ideas  should,  as  far  as  the  army  is  concerned,  filter  through  three 
examining  bodies.  First,  the  War  College,  where  they  will 
be  considered  from  the  aspect  of  the  three  defence  forces  com- 
bined ;  secondly,  the  Tactical  University  (which  I  will  explain 
later) ,  where  they  will  theoretically  be  compared  with  the  existing 
values  of  all  arms  separately  and  combined  ;  thirdly,  the  Staff 
College,  where  the  changes  in  tactics  suggested  will  be  organized 
and  administration  shaped  to  meet  them.  When  these  three 
processes  have  been  completed,  the  refined  idea  should  then 
be  handed  over  to  the  experimental  unit  to  test  out,  and  the 
staff  and  students  of  the  Staff  College  and  Tactical  University 
should  be  kept  in  close  touch  with  the  experiments — the  action 
resulting.  Directly  the  new  idea  has  been  satisfactorily  tested 
out,  it  should  be  adopted  by  the  general  staff  and  the  army 
modified  accordingly. 

As  the  whole  existing  military  organization  will  have  to  be 
reformed,  the  work  to  be  carried  out  is  enormous  ;  consequently, 
some  logical  plan  of  procedure  must  be  established,  for  other- 
wise time  and  effort,  let  alone  money,  will  be  squandered.  At 
what  end  or  part  of  the  army  are  we  to  begin  our  demolition 
and  reconstruction  ?     This  question  is  a  very  easy  one  to  answer 


240  The  Reformation  of  War 

if  we  write  down  the  main  needs  of  the    soldier    in    order   of 
importance.     They  are  : 

(i.)  The  first  requirement  of  the  soldier  is  to  live — he  requires 

food  and  lodging, 
(ii.)  The  second  requirement  is  protection  while  he  approaches 

the  enemy, 
(iii.)  The  third  requirement  is  fighting  power,  in  order  to 

defeat  the  enemy. 

We  should,  therefore,  begin  by  mechanicalizing  our  trans- 
port. This  is  the  simplest  problem,  being  purely  administrative 
and  not  tactical ;  meanwhile  our  existing  artillery  and  infantry 
can  remain  much  as  they  are. 

Secondly,  we  should  mechanicalize  our  artillery — our  main 
protective  weapon,  and  a  simpler  arm  to  deal  with  than  infantry, 
who  can  still  continue  to  remain  somewhat  as  they  are. 

Thirdly,  we  should  mechanicalize  our  infantry  by  placing 
some  in  tanks — the  attackers  of  positions,  and  some  in  cross- 
country "  buses  " — the  holders  of  positions. 

Surely  this  evolution  is  an  economical  one,  for  we  cannot 
expect  our  present  army  to  adapt  itself  to  a  new  means  of 
movement  in  two  or  three  years ;  in  my  opinion,  accepting 
man  as  he  is,  a  very  conservative  animal,  the  whole  process 
will  take  about  a  military  generation — say  twenty  years. 

Having  now  arrived  at  a  logical  plan  of  action,  the  next 
question  is  the  size  of  the  army  we  wish  to  create.  Hitherto 
the  size  of  the  army  has  borne  little  relationship  to  national 
needs,  because  defence  policy  has  been  built  upon  expedients 
and  not  on  principles.  Before  the  recent  war,  why  did  the 
Home  Army  consist  of  six  divisions,  why  not  four  or  five  or  seven 
or  eight  or  eighty  ?  The  late  Field-Marshal  Sir  Henry  Wilson 
was  never  tired  of  repeating  that  there  was  no  military  reason 
for  six  divisions — none  !  In  fact  the  reason  had  nothing  to 
do  with  military  requirements,  for  it  was  based  on  unemploy- 
ment in  the  civil  labour  markets.  Before  the  war  it  was  found 
possible  to  recruit  on  an  average  30,000  to  35,000  unemployed 


The  Reformation  of  the  Army  241 

or  unemployable  men  yearly.  Such  numbers  would  enable 
six  divisions  at  home  to  train  reinforcements  for  a  certain 
number  of  units  abroad,  consequently  six  divisions  were 
considered  sufficient.     There  was  no  military  reason — none  ! 

The  Great  War  eventually  required  between  seventy  and 
eighty  divisions.  To  suggest  such  a  number  to-day  would  be 
foolish,  because  we  are  not  faced  by  a  great  war  problem ;  our 
problem  is  not  to  fight  another  World  War  but  to  maintain  the 
integrity  of  the  Empire.  What  does  the  maintenance  of  this 
integrity  entail  ?     I  will  repeat  the  answer  yet  again  : 

(i.)  First,  domestic  peace. 

(ii.)  Secondly,  power  to  win  small  wars. 

(iii.)  Thirdly,  power  to  prevent  or  win  great  wars. 

I  will,  therefore,  from  the  point  of  view  of  reformation  deal 
with  these  three  problems  in  turn. 

As  I  have  already  pointed  out,  the  problem  of  internal  defence 
is  a  fairly  simple  one,  as  rioters  and  rebels  are  usually  badly 
armed.  Police  work  presupposes  the  rapid  movement  of  small 
bodies  of  men  so  armed  that  they  can  break  up  hostile  assemblies, 
and,  consequently,  prevent  them  from  solidifying  into  organized 
form  ;  for  the  first  step,  in  order  to  quell  a  revolution,  is  to 
keep  it  fluid  or  mobile — in  other  words  to  deny  it  stability, 
without  which  it  cannot  for  long  exist. 

The  only  satisfactory  way  to  carry  this  out  is  to  organize 
dispersion  of  force  prior  to  the  emergency,  and  this  is  best 
accomplished  by  establishing  over  the  country  in  question  a 
series  of  police  posts  which  are  sufficiently  stable  to  withstand 
attack  and  sufficiently  mobile  to  assist  each  other. 

Having  no  firm  precedent  to  work  on,  I  will  start  with  a 
theoretical  example.  I  will  take  an  area  of  country  six  hundred 
miles  long  and  three  hundred  miles  wide  which  is  in  a  disturbed 
condition,  and  will  then  ask  myself  this  question  :  "  What  will 
be  the  most  economical  and  efficient  method  of  policing  it  ?  " 
To  begin  with  I  will  split  this  rectangle  up  into  two  primary 
squares,  A  B  E  F  and  B  C  D  E,  and  each  of  these  squares  into  four 

16 


242 


The  Reformation  of  War 


major  squares  and  each  major  square  into  four  minor  squares  ; 
each  minor  square  will  then  have  a  side  of  seventy-five  miles. 

In  the  centre  of  each  minor  square  I  place  a  mobile  group, 
shown  by  a  black  dot,  or  I  run  two  or  four  minor  squares  together 
and  place  a  dot  in  their  centre.  At  K  and  M,  I  place  a  stable 
reserve,  shown  by  a  small  square.  In  order  to  arrive  at  some 
basis  of  calculation,  I  suggest  a  force  of  fifty  mounted  men  as 
sufficient  to  patrol  each  minor  square,  and  for  a  rectangle  twice 
this  number,  and  for  a  square  four  times  the  size  of  the  minor 
square  (e.g.  square  nrso)  four  times  this  number.     It  then  will 


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be  found  that  the  whole  area  A  C  D  F  is  divided  into  three 
rectilineal  figures,  namely  A  C  e  1, 1  e  f  k  and  k  f  D  F.  These  figures 
contain  the  following  mobile  forces :  400,  800  and  400  mounted 
men,  which  in  principle  is  sound,  because  this  organization 
permits  of  a  strong  backbone  of  police  running  through  the  centre 
of  the  country. 

The  above  comprises  the  mobile  element,  but  as  mobility 
should  always  operate  from  stability,  I  will  add  two  armoured 
cars  (crews  15  men),  preferably  of  a  cross-country  type,  to  every 
50  mounted  men.  This  will  enable  these  men  to  be  supported  by 
48  armoured  cars. 

At  K  and  M,  I  place  two  mechanical  striking  forces,  the 


The  Reformation  of  the  Army  243 

object  of  which  is  to  supply  stability  to  the  mobile  outpost 
organization.  These  forces  I  suggest  should  be  organized  as 
follows  : 

(i.)  One  company  of  tanks — 12  machines,  140  personnel. 

(ii.)  One  company  of  armoured  cars — 12  machines,  140  per- 
sonnel. 

(hi.)  One  battery  of  mechanical  gun  carriers — 6  guns,  90 
personnel. 

(iv.)  One  flight  of  aeroplanes,  6  machines,  80  personnel. 

(v.)  One  company  of  cross-country  tractors,  12  machines, 
80  personnel. 

(vi.)  One  machine-gun  company,  12  guns,  100  personnel. 

(vii.)  Signallers  and  sappers — 120  personnel. 

The  total  fighting  personnel  will  then  be  750. 
The  combatant  personnel  of  the  entire  police  force  will  then 
consist  of  the  following  : 


(a)  1,600  mounted  men. 

(b)  1,860  mechanical  troops. 


The  latter  being  equipped  with  24  tanks,  72  armoured  cars, 
12  field  guns,  12  aeroplanes,  24  cross-country  tractors  and  24 
machine  guns. 

In  normal  conditions,  the  mechanical  columns  will  remain 
stationary,  and  the  whole  of  the  area  A  C  D  F  will  be  patrolled 
by  the  mounted  men.  Should  rebellion  break  out,  which  any  one 
or  more  of  the  mobile  groups  is  unable  to  suppress,  these  would 
at  once  stabilize  themselves  in  their  defended  posts  and  the 
mechanical  columns  would  move  out  and  become  the  mobile 
element  of  the  police  organization.  As  the  rebels  are  unlikely 
to  possess  weapons  which  will  impede  the  movement  of  these 
armoured  forces,  their  effect  should  prove  decisive. 

I  fully  realize  that,  in  practice,  the  policing  of  an  unsettled 
country  is  not  so  simple  as  depicted  above  ;  that  countries 
are  not  rectangles,  and  that  forces  of  men  cannot  sit  in  the 
middle   of   hypothetical   squares.     Nevertheless,   I   now  intend 

16* 


244  The  Reformation  of  War 

to  apply  my  theory  to  the  actual  problem  of  Imperial  security 
in  order  to  show  that  the  principle  of  movement  underlying  it 
is,  as  I  believe,  sound.  If  I  am  right,  the  adjustment  of  detail 
to  local  circumstances  becomes  simply  a  matter  of  elementary 
common-sense.  As  a  datum  point  I  will  start  with  India,  for 
the  security  of  India  is  our  greatest  military  liability. 

In  1913  the  garrison  of  India  was  approximately  as  follows  : 

(i.)  76,000  British  troops, 
(ii.)  160,000  Indian  troops  (less  reserves), 
(hi.)  21,000  Imperial  Service  troops, 
(iv.)  39,000  Volunteers. 

In  all  some  300,000  men,  of  which  the  British  and  Indian 
Armies  cost  about  £21,000,000  yearly. 

I  will  suppose  that  a  tank  exists  which  has  a  speed  of  20 
miles  per  hour  on  the  flat,  a  radius  of  action  of  400  miles,  and  that 
it  will  run  3,000  miles  before  requiring  to  be  overhauled. 

India  consists  of  some  1,800,000  square  miles  of  land,  of  which 
about  400,000  square  miles  may  be  deducted  as  sparsely  inhabited 
mountain  and  desert  country.  I  will  now  apply  my  grid  theory, 
and  divide  1,400,000  miles  of  country  into  squares  of  the  side 
of  300  miles.  The  quotient  is  approximately  16.  I  will  call 
the  forces  required  to  hold  each  of  these  squares — a  mounted 
regiment  (800  men)  and  a  mechanical  battalion  (930  men)  ;  then 
for  police  work  we  shall  require  16  regiments  and  16  battalions. 
It  should  be  noted  here  that  I  am  treating  India  as  a  thoroughly 
unsettled  country  and  so  am  assuming  the  worst  case  possible. 

The  next  question  is  what  is  to  happen  if  a  small  war  breaks 
out  ?  As  it  would  be  dangerous  to  withdraw  the  police  force, 
a  central  reserve  must  be  established  to  meet  such  an  eventuality. 
The  strength  of  this  reserve  army,  I  suggest,  should  be  sixteen 
mechanical  units  of  say  930  strong  each,  these  to  be  equipped 
with  the  three  main  types  of  tanks  which,  in  Chapter  VIII.,  I 
visualized  future  warfare  would  demand,  namely,  an  artillery 
tank,  an  infantry  tank  and  a  cavalry  tank.     As  these  units  are 


The  Reformation  of  the  Army  245 

not  generally  suitable  for  garrison  work  or  for  all  phases  of 
mountain  warfare,  a  second  line  army  must  be  maintained. 
For  this  I  suggest  a  force  of  four  divisions  of  about  12,000  men 
each.  I  will  call  this  force  the  Garrison  Army  in  order  to  dis- 
tinguish it  from  the  Mechanical  Army,  the  units  of  which  might 
be  organized  as  follows  :  One  regiment  to  consist  of  two  bat- 
talions, one  brigade  of  two  regiments  and  one  division  of  two 
brigades.  The  strength  of  a  mechanical  division  will  then  be 
7,440  men.  For  purposes  of  administration  I  will  add  forty 
per  cent,  to  the  total  combatant  strength. 

The  military  forces  required  in  India  will  then  be  : 

(i.)  16  mounted  police  regiments  (12,800  British  and  Indian), 
(ii.)  2  mechanical  police  divisions    (14,880  British), 
(iii.)  2  mechanical  reserve  divisions  (14,880  British), 
(iv.)  4  garrison  divisions  (48,000  British  and  Indian), 
(v.)  Administrative  personnel  (36,224  British  and  Indian). 

A  total  of  126,784  British  and  Indian  soldiers,  and  not  236,000, 
as  was  the  case  in  1913. 

Outside  India  our  main  military  responsibilities  lie  in  Iraq 
and  Egypt ;  one  mechanical  police  division  and  eight  mounted 
police  regiments  should  be  sufficient  for  these  countries,  and,  if 
a  small  war  breaks  out  and  reinforcements  are  required,  they 
can  be  sent  out  either  from  India  or  from  home. 

The  last  question  is  that  of  a  great  war.  Great  wars  do  not 
suddenly  shake  the  world  like  an  earthquake  ;  they  occur  about 
once  every  fifty  years  and  normally  give  a  prolonged  notice  of 
their  advent.   In  preparing  to  meet  them  we  require  three  things. 

(i.)  A  body  of  men  who  can  appreciate  their  growth  and 

predict  the  probable  date  of  their  outbreak, 
(ii.)  A  thoroughly  good  foundation  whereon  to  expand  our 

defence  forces  when  the  above  body  of  men  issue  their 

warning, 
(iii.)  Power  of  the  most  rapid  expansion  when  the  warning  is 

issued. 


246  The  Reformation  of  War 

As  regards  the  first,  this  is  the  duty  of  the  generalissimo 
and  the  combined  general  staff.  The  second  and  third  I  will 
now  consider. 

As  the  foundation  I  suggest  the  following  force  : 

(i.)  5  mechanical  reserve  divisions  (37,200  men). 

(ii.)  3  garrison  divisions  (36,000  men). 

(iii.)  Administrative  personnel  (29,280  men). 

A  total  force  of  102,480  men.  The  garrison  divisions  should 
be  so  organized  and  trained  that  they  can  rapidly  expand  into 
nine  mechanical  reserve  divisions ;  consequently,  they  should  be 
partly  mechanicalized  during  peace  time. 

If  the  self-governing  Dominions  also  mechanicalize  part  of  their 
military  forces,  there  would  appear  to  be  no  reason  why  Canada 
should  not  raise  two  divisions  (one  possibly  in  cadre),  Australia 
one,  and  New  Zealand  and  South  Africa  one  between  them. 

For  a  great  war  we  then  arrive  at  a  total  of  twenty  mechanical 
reserve  divisions  the  power  of  which  when  compared  to  that  of 
existing  divisions  can  only  be  thought  of  in  terms  of  Dread- 
noughts and  three-deckers. 

The  above  suggestions  are  admittedly  crude.  I  have  not 
aimed  at  exactness  in  any  form,  but  solely  at  illustrating  a  prin- 
ciple of  reformation — a  foundation  and  a  line  of  direction  ;  that 
is  all.  I  will  now  turn  to  my  third  requirement,  power  of  ex- 
pansion to  frustrate  or  limit  a  great  war. 

In  the  past,  power  of  expansion  has  been  viewed  almost 
entirely  from  a  physical  and  numerical  standpoint — reserves  of 
men  and  materiel.  This  is,  however,  but  one  aspect  of  the 
subject  and  not  the  chief  one.  Preparation  to  be  scientific, 
in  my  opinion,  includes  the  following  : 

(i.)  Military  foresight.  To  any  student  of  European  history 
between  the  years  1864  and  1914,  it  must  be  apparent  that  Ger- 
many was  organizing  herself  to  upset  the  balance  of  world  power, 
and  that  all  the  causes  of  the  recent  war  were  sown  prior  to  the 
year  1900  ;  further,  that,  between  1901  and  1914,  pretexts  to 
declare  war  were  constantly  sought  for  by  Germany.     In  England, 


The  Reformation  of  the  Army  247 

Lord  Roberts  and  others  saw  this  quite  clearly ;  yet  as  late  as 
1912,  when  this  eminent  soldier  proposed  the  creation  of  a 
national  army,  he  was  openly  flouted  by  the  general  staff.* 
Worse  still,  he  was  derided  in  the  House  of  Commons,  and  still 
worse,  when,  in  1912,  Lord  Haldane  visited  Berlin  at  the  request 
of  the  Kaiser,  "  the  Kaiser  demanded  a  free  hand  for  European 
conquests  at  the  price  of  a  friendly  understanding  with  England. 
England  was  asked  to  pledge  herself  to  absolute  neutrality  in 
the  event  of  Germany  being  engaged  in  a  war."  On  his  return 
what  did  he  do  ?  In  place  of  taking  the  nation  into  his  con- 
fidence, he  hoodwinked  the  people,  who  only  learnt  the  truth  of 
the  situation  in  1912  shortly  after  the  battle  of  the  Marne  in 
1914! 

I  maintain  that  these  things  must  never  be  again,  for  un- 
preparedness  for  war  is  a  greater  incentive  to  its  outbreak  than 
over-preparation.  Had  we  had,  let  us  suppose,  in  1908,  a  highly 
trained  combined  general  staff  and  a  generalissimo  of  moral 
courage,  I  imagine  this  is  what  he  would  have  suggested  to  the 
Prime  Minister  :  "  The  balance  of  power  is  being  upset  because 
Germany  is  adding  to  her  immense  army  a  formidable  fleet, 
and  any  nation  which  controls  the  sea  as  well  as  the  land  controls 
the  world.  We  rightly  have  not  introduced  conscription,  for 
had  we  done  so  the  identical  accusation  I  am  now  levelling 
against  Germany  would  have  been  levelled  against  us.  Never- 
theless, the  situation  is  becoming  so  critical  that,  in  my  opinion, 
you  should  take  the  nation  into  your  confidence  and  then  say  to 
Germany :  '  We  have  tolerated  your  immense  army  long 
enough  ;  we  do  not,  however,  intend  to  tolerate  an  immense  German 
navy  as  well,  for  we  know  that  this  must  lead  to  a  world  war. 
We  do  not  want  a  world  war,  and,  to  prevent  its  outbreak  or  to 
shorten  its  duration,  we  intend,  while  we  are  still  strong  enough 
at  sea  to  drive  you  off  it  and  to  occupy  your  colonies  and  capture 
your  trade,  not  only  to  lay  down  two  keels  to  every  one  of  yours, 
but  to  raise  an  army  of  1,000,000  men  and  to  support  whatever 

*  See  "  Our  Requirements  for  Home  Defence,"  The  Army  Review,  Vol.  III., 
July,  1912. 


248  The  Reformation  of  War 

country  you  attack.  But  directly  you  reduce  your  fleet  to  its 
1900  footing  and  cease  increasing  your  army  we  will  reduce  our 
army  of  1,000,000  to  its  present  numerical  strength.'  " 

Such  a  jaw  blow  might  have  led  to  immediate  war,  which 
could  scarcely  have  been  worse  than  the  war  of  1914-1918.  It 
might,  however,  have  knocked  the  German  project  out  of  the 
German  head.  But,  it  may  be  urged,  our  party  political  system 
does  not  permit  of  such  frank  action  ;  then  all  I  can  say  is  that  our 
political  system  needs  a  thorough  spring  cleaning.  The  outbreak 
of  the  Great  War,  in  1914,  was  due  not  only  to  German  militarism 
but  to  British  pacifism.  Both  were  equally  to  blame,  one  was 
flint  and  the  other  was  steel. 

(ii.)  National  Registration.  The  whole  of  the  civil  population 
should  be  registered  for  war  according  to  their  vocations,  so  that 
when  war  breaks  out  a  man  who  knows  eleven  languages  is  not 
sent  to  St.  Nazaire  as  a  R.T.O.  and  a  professor  of  English  history 
turned  into  a  sanitary  fatigue  man.  Each  class  should  have  its 
mobilization  centre  and  should  come  on  to  war  pay  on  the  out- 
break of  hostilities. 

(iii.)  Calculation  of  Resources.  The  entire  resources  of  the 
Empire  should  be  scheduled  for  war,  so  that  it  may  be  known 
exactly  what  these  resources  are  and  how  deficits  may  be  made 
good,  not  only  in  order  to  assist  military  operations  but  to  lessen 
the  unhinging  of  industry  and  commerce. 

(iv.)  Standardization  of  Factories.  All  factories,  laboratories, 
etc.,  should,  within  the  limits  of  peace  economy,  be  standardized 
for  war,  so  that,  when  war  breaks  out,  they  can  easily  be  changed 
from  a  peace  footing  to  a  war  footing.  The  same  process  should 
also  be  applied  to  means  of  movement  by  road,  rail,  sea  and 
canal. 

The  above  I  consider  to  be  the  main  national  preparations 
for  war,  and  in  order  to  guarantee  expansion  of  national  force 
before  and  after  war  has  been  declared.  I  will  now  turn  to  what 
I  believe  to  be  the  primary  military  preparative,  namely,  training, 
and  the  power  of  accelerating  training  when  war  becomes  im- 
minent or  after  its  outbreak. 


The  Reformation  of  the  Army  249 

Training  in  an  army  may  be  divided  into  two  main  categories  : 

(i.)  Unit  training  (the  training  of  individuals  and  units), 
(ii.)  School  instruction  (the  education  of  instructors). 

The  first  should  be  based  on  the  following  rule  :  No  individual, 
once  he  has  finished  his  individual  training,  should  be  considered 
fully  trained  until  he  can  take  the  -place  of  his  immediate  superior. 
Thus  in  a  section  of  eight  infantry  men,  there  is  one  section  com- 
mander and  seven  followers.  This  section  should  not  be  con- 
sidered trained  until  the  section  commander  can  command  a 
platoon  and  each  of  the  seven  men  can  command  a  section. 
To  the  private  soldier,  thinking  of  the  future  is  thinking  of  the 
next  grade.  With  a  unit  it  is  very  much  the  same  ;  no  unit  should 
be  considered  fully  trained  until  it  can  co-operate  with  all  other 
units  in  the  formation  to  which  it  belongs.  This  rule  carries 
with  it  the  main  power  of  military  expansion,  for  every  officer 
and  man  right  down  to  the  private  soldier  will,  when  expansion 
is  ordered,  be  in  the  position  to  fill  a  grade  above  the  one  he 
actually  holds  and  instruct  the  grade  below  the  one  to  which 
he  is  promoted. 

The  second  should  strive  at  the  attainment  of  the  following 
objective  :  the  object  of  school  instruction  is  first,  to  teach 
men  how  to  teach  men,  and  secondly,  to  teach  men  what  to  teach 
men.  Every  school,  no  matter  what  subject  is  taught  in  it, 
should  pay  the  greatest  attention  to  human  psychology. 

I  have  already  accentuated  the  vital  importance  of  the  creation 
of  a  War  College  and  a  reformation  of  the  Staff  College.  I  now 
will  consider,  not  all  necessary  schools,  but  the  co-ordination  of 
one  large  group  of  schools — the  weapon  schools. 

In  most  armies  a  separate  school  exists  for  instruction  in  each 
weapon  or  branch  of  the  service.  Thus  we  find  :  Rifle,  Machine 
Gun,  Cavalry,  Field  Gun,  Gas  and  Sapper  Schools,  etc.  This 
is  as  it  should  be,  as  it  enables  the  technique  of  each  arm  to  be 
acquired,  but  it  is  not  sufficient,  as  technique  is  subordinate  to 
tactics,  and  the  various  parts  of  an  army — infantry,  cavalry, 


250  The  Reformation  of  War 

artillery,  etc.,  seldom  fight  as  separated  units.  In  order  to  co- 
ordinate the  instruction  gained  in  the  Weapon  Schools,  a  Tactical 
University  is  required,  the  duty  of  which  is  to  set  together  the 
elements  of  war  in  a  coherent  tactical  scheme.  Dealing  with 
men  as  well  as  with  weapons,  movement  and  protection,  in  it  must 
be  taught  the  psychology  of  leadership  as  well  as  the  mechanism 
of  tactics  and  the  organization  of  contentment.  To-day  such  a 
school  does  not  exist  in  any  army,  which  fact  only  accentuates 
its  importance. 

I  have  now  dealt  with  the  reformation  of  the  brain  and  body 
of  the  army,  and,  in  the  remaining  pages  of  this  Chapter,  I  intend, 
very  briefly,  to  consider  the  reformation  of  its  soul,  which,  curious 
as  it  may  seem,  is  very  closely  related  to  money — the  sinews  of 
administration. 

Economically,  management  revolves  between  two  poles — 
centralization  and  decentralization.  The  one  cannot  exist 
without  the  other,  but,  in  non-competitive  organizations,  the 
first  is  always  apt  to  become  obese.  I  have  already,  in  Chapter 
III.,  dealt  with  the  organization  of  government  departments,  and 
have  shown  that  ministries  are  virtually  monasteries  in  which 
the  law  of  the  survival  of  the  fittest  ceasing  to  operate  results  in 
the  creation  of  a  body  of  administrators  who,  having  lost  all 
human  touch,  have  become  soulless  shells  of  men. 

The  following  are,  I  believe,  the  main  causes  of  this  spiritual 
decrepitude : 

(i.)  Lack  of  an  economic  objective.  The  economic  objective 
of  army  administration  is  to  transmute  money  into  military 
efficiency  and  not  to  spend  money  according  to  regulations 
which  may  be  totally  inapplicable  to  existing  circumstances. 
This  is  common-sense  ;  nevertheless  our  present  Treasury  System 
(last  reformed  in  1689)  seldom  enables  this  virtue  to  be  exercised. 

To  the  soldier,  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  duty  of  a 
battalion  commander  is  to  obtain  in  his  battalion  the  highest 
possible  standard  of  fighting  efficiency.  I  will  suppose  that  this 
efficiency  is  represented  by  a,  b,  c,  d,  .  .  .  n ;  that  "  a  "  is  musketry, 
"  b"  bayonet  fighting,  "  c"  recreation  and  "  d  "  physical  health. 


The  Reformation  of  the  Army  251 

Suppose  now  that  the  central  management  has  laid  down  that 
£100  is  allotted  for  training  in  musketry ;  but,  as  it  happens, 
this  battalion  does  not  require  it  for  musketry,  being  highly 
efficient  in  this  subject,  and,  the  battalion  being  quartered  in 
the  centre  of  a  large  town,  its  commander  would  like  to  expend 
this  money  on  the  hire  of  a  neighbouring  field,  which  will  enable 
him  to  train  his  men  in  bayonet  fighting,  for  which  he  has  no 
facilities,  and,  incidentally,  will  enable  them  to  play  football 
every  afternoon.  Should  permission  be  granted  to  him,  not 
only  will  his  men  become  more  efficient  but  more  physically 
fit  and  more  contented,  all  very  valuable  assets.  But,  alas  !  as 
every  soldier  knows,  it  is  very  seldom  granted,  because,  if  a 
battalion  costs,  I  will  suppose,  -£200,000  a  year,  this  sum  is  divided 
up  into  "  watertight  "  compartments  ;  so  much  for  food,  so  much 
for  pay,  so  much  for  clothing,  so  much  for  musketry,  etc.,  etc. 
In  fact  the  object  of  finance  is  not  to  obtain  the  maximum 
efficiency  at  a  minimum  cost,  but  the  maximum  observation  of 
routine  regulations  out  of  a  fixed  sum  of  money.  Such  a  pro- 
cedure can  bear  no  relationship  to  changing  circumstances, 
consequently  it  is  contrary  to  common-sense,  and  not  only  destroys 
the  desire  to  attain  efficiency  but  stimulates  dishonesty  if  this 
desire  refuses  to  die. 

Suppose  now,  for  example,  that  a  complete  decentralization 
be  agreed  to  and  that  the  whole  of  the  £200,000  be  handed  over  to 
the  battalion  commander,  and  that  a  standard  of  efficiency  be  laid 
down  for  all  objects  of  expenditure,  and  that,  directly  any  one 
standard  is  attained,  any  surplus  money  be  allocated  to  assist  in 
the  attainment  of  the  remainder,  and  that  at  the  completion  of 
each  year  a  comparative  table  be  made  out  for  all  units  in  the 
army  showing  : 

(a)  The  standard  of  efficiency  reached. 

(b)  The  expenditure  in  attaining  this  efficiency. 

(c)  The  balance  of  money  left  over  after  attaining  it. 

Then  it  will  be  possible  to  see  at  a  glance  which  are  the  most 
economical  battalions  and  who  are  the  most  efficient  commanders, 
and  according  to  their  degree  of  efficiency  should  they  be  rewarded 


252  The  Reformation  of  War 

by  promotion  or  extra  pay,  and  according  to  their  degree  of 
failure  either  dismissed  or  their  pay  reduced. 

By  this  system  the  unit  commander  would  control  his  own 
accounts,  and  the  present  accountants  and  auditors  would 
cease  to  be  the  dictators  of  his  accounts. 

I  fully  realize  that  so  complete  a  decentralization  cannot  and 
should  not  be  attempted;  nevertheless,  steps  should  be  taken 
as  far  as  it  is  possible,  and  certainly  as  regards  training,  to  de- 
centralize the  present  soul-destroying  system.  Some  cases  of 
individual  dishonesty  may  result  (as  they  do  to-day),  but  I  doubt 
whether  any  dishonesty  could  possibly  be  as  expensive  as  the 
safeguardings  of  the  present  Treasury  restrictions,  for  corruption 
is  not  safeguarded  against  by  refusing  to  declare  a  dividend — 
efficiency,  but  by  a  constant  inspection  of  the  executive  (human 
not  paper)  side  of  the  business. 

(ii.)  Lack  of  application  of  economic  principles.  I  do  not  here 
propose  to  enter  into  an  analysis  of  the  principles  of  "  supply  and 
demand,"  "  profit  and  loss  "  and  the  law  of  "  decreasing  returns," 
but  in  place  to  lay  down  four  economic  principles  which  are  not 
observed  by  the  financial  management  of  the  army.  They  are  as 
follows  : 

(a)  The  balancing  of  accounts  is  not  in  itself  equivalent  to 
efficiency  in  training.* 

(b)  Training,  to  be  economical,  depends  on  the  acceptance  of 
a  policy  which  will  influence  with  the  least  detriment  commercial 
prosperity. 

(c)  The  cost  of  an  army  can  only  be  considered  economical 
when  the  army  attains  a  higher  efficiency  than  the  depreciation  of 
capital  consequent  on  its  attainment,  f 

(d)  Unremunerative  expenditure  by  decreasing  the  value  of  a 
soldier  as  a  citizen  is  as  grave  an  injustice  to  the  nation  as  in- 

*  Conversely,  if  efficiency  in  training  does  not  result,  however  carefully 
the  accounts  may  have  been  balanced,  the  money  spent  will  have  been  squandered. 

■f  I.e.,  as  the  civil  capital  value  of  a  soldier  may  be  taken  at  ^6,000  and  his 
yearly  depreciation  at  £300,  his  military  efficiency  must  be  worth  to  the  nation 
more  than  ^300  a  year. 


The  Reformation  of  the  Army  253 

adequate  expenditure  which  reduces  his  capacity  as  a  fighting 
man.* 

The  non-observance  of  these  principles  by  the  army,  on  ac- 
count of  the  existing  Treasury  restrictions,  results  in  a  yearly 
wastage  of  many  millions  of  pounds,  let  alone  an  incalculable  loss 
of  efficiency. 

(iii.)  Lack  of  appreciation  of  economic  conditions.  In  econo- 
mics, as  in  war,  conditions  either  assist  or  resist  the  economist, 
who,  consequently,  must  possess  dynamic  force,  that  is — power 
to  change.  The  struggle  for  existence  applies  to  him  as  to 
all  other  human  activities ;  it  constitutes  an  impeccable  sorting 
machine,  for  without  competition  there  can  be  no  economic 
growth.  To  vegetate  is  not  to  economize,  and  yet  this  is  precisely 
what  most  armies  in  the  past  have  done ;  they  have,  in  fact,  re- 
mained static  absorbers  of  money — bun-swallowing  bears  which, 
when  well  caged  by  Treasury  restrictions,  are  kept  to  amuse  the 
populace.  There  is  as  much  difference  between  a  growing  army 
and  a  subsisting  army  as  there  is  between  a  growing  tree  and 
a  branch  in  a  jug  of  water. 

Sir  John  Keane  writes  :  "  The  manager  of  a  department  in  a 
business  is  given  a  free  hand  and  judged  by  results.  If  the  results 
are  bad,  he  probably  gets  the  sack  ;  if  good,  he  is  probably  pro- 
moted. But  the  essential  point  is  that  power  for  good  or  bad  lies 
with  the  individual."!  In  an  over-centralized  organization  what 
do  we  find  ?  We  find  that  the  permanent  officials  are  tied  down 
to  fixed  rules  and  regulations,  and  that  the  executive  personnel 
adminstered  by  them  are  tied  down  by  these  officials,  whose  rules 
and  regulations,  normally,  bear  not  the  faintest  relationship  to 
existing  requirements,  their  utility  having  years  before  grown 
impotent. 

In  order  to  amend  these  "  Chinese  writings  "  the  conditions 
of  military  management  must  be  placed  on  a  level  with  those  to  be 

*  I  have  adapted  the  above  principles  from  a  paper  on  "  Military  Economics  " 
written  by  my  friend  Brigadier-General  W.  G.  Ramsey  Fairfax,  D.S.O. 

f  "  Government  Extravagance  and  its  Remedy,"  National  Review, 
July,  1920.     Also  see  "  The  Zealots,"  by  the  same  author. 


254  The  Reformation  of  War 

found  in  any  well-conducted  business.  The  object  must  be  laid 
down  as  well  as  the  requirements  requisite  to  attain  it,  and  then, 
as  Sir  John  Keane  says  : 

"...  the  Treasury  should  fix  the  sum  and  the  executive 
officers  should  decide  how  it  is  to  be  spent.  Those  who  know  the 
facts  must  be  allowed  a  free  hand.  Those  who  do  not  know  the 
facts,  like  the  Treasury,  and  try  to  control  in  detail,  will  be  hum- 
bugged every  time.  ...  In  business  a  proper  system  of  cost 
accounts  enables  an  employee  to  be  placed  in  a  position  of  re- 
sponsibility with  sufficient  working  capital,  and  to  be  judged  by 
results." 

Military  efficiency,  I  maintain,  can  be  evolved  just  as  readily 
as  its  counterpart  in  business,  if  an  army  is  endowed  with  a  soul, 
and  souls  are  born  of  responsibility — free  will,  and  thrive  through 
judgment — free  criticism.  To  be  predestined  to  do  something  is 
to  be  damned,  and  the  damned  go  down  to  hell  or  to  Aldershot. 

I  am  not  such  a  purblind  pedant  as  to  believe  that  the  system 
of  reformation  outlined  in  this  chapter  should  forthwith  be 
adopted.  Though  a  system,  it  is  but  an  illustration  of  an  idea, 
and  for  this  idea,  this  acorn  of  thought,  to  sprout  into  an  oak  and 
grow  will  require  years  of  careful  thought,  and  before  this  thought 
can  develop  prejudice  in  things  old  must  cease. 

To-day  the  British  Army  may  be  compared  to  the  owner  of  a 
stately  Jacobean  mansion  who  cannot  afford  to  keep  it  in  repair. 
It  has  been  in  his  family  for  300  years,  and  he  naturally  is  very 
loath  to  part  with  it  and  inhabit  some  horrible  ferro-concrete 
house.  He  cannot  afford  to  modernize  it,  and,  to  make  both  ends 
meet,  he  shuts  up  room  after  room,  and  so  "  economizes  "  his 
reduced  income  and  hopes  for  better  times.  He  cannot  tear 
himself  away  from  its  memories  and  traditions  and  family  ghosts, 
and  so  the  dry-rot  creeps  through  its  foundations  and  the  rain 
percolates  through  its  roof. 

The  passing  of  grandeur  is  always  a  sad  sight,  but  what  is  a 
sadder  sight  still  is  to  watch  those  who  once  were  grand  imagining 
that  they  can  continue  to  be  so  in  decrepitude.  Houses  are 
made  for  men  and  not  men  for  houses,  so  also  are  armies  created 


The  Reformation  of  the  Army  255 

to  protect  nations  and  not  nations  to  maintain  obsolete  armies. 
Yet  it  is  the  nation  which  must  pay  for  the  building  of  the  new 
military  house,  and  as  long  as  this  habitation  is  not  built  the  nation 
must  not  complain  if  its  army  continues  to  shelter  itself  in  its 
tumble-down  old  mansion.  To  camp  in  the  open,  these  trouble- 
some times,  is  sheer  folly.  To  build  means  money.  What  the 
army  to-day  requires,  in  order  that  military  economies  may  be 
effected,  is  a  sum  of  money — I  will  suppose  £50,000,000  as  a  loan, 
and  then  a  fixed  allowance  of,  I  will  suppose,  a  similar  sum  for 
the  next  ten  years.  Out  of  this  allowance,  or  budget,  it  should 
pay  a  yearly  interest  on  the  loan  of  five  per  cent,  and  pay  back 
£5,000,000  at  the  end  of  each  financial  year.  To-day,  this  is  im- 
possible, as  the  Treasury  System  does  not  permit  of  it ;  further, 
possessing  no  combined  general  staff,  a  thinking  organ,  no  archi- 
tect exists  who  can  plan  the  new  residence.  Instead,  economy  is 
sought  by  each  year  strapping  the  army  on  to  the  financial  operat- 
ing table,  and  by  removing  bits  of  its  arms,  legs  and  internal 
organs.  The  result  is  that  the  army  is  in  a  perpetual  state  of 
convalescence ;  one  day  its  crippled  remains  may  be  allowed  to 
hobble  along  on  two  sticks,  and  this  is  called  economizing  !  If 
economy  it  be,  then  surely  must  Bedlam  be  the  Adytum  of  econo- 
mics. Would  it  not  be  wiser  to  cry  with  King  John  :  "  Bedlam 
have  done  !  " 


XIII 

THE   PEACE   WHICH   PASSETH   UNDERSTANDING 

IN  the  last  two  Chapters  I  outlined  the  main  features  of  an 
organization  which,  I  am  of  opinion,  can  produce  the 
scientific  military  thinker,  without  whom  warfare  must  continue 
to  flounder  through  traditional  darkness.  As  from  the  alchemist 
of  the  Middle  Ages  arose  the  chemist  of  to-day,  so  do  I  believe 
that,  from  the  swashbuckler  of  the  present  period  will  arise  the 
war-scientist  of  the  future,  who,  understanding  war  and  its 
purpose,  will  liberate  the  armies  of  civilized  powers  from  the  ob- 
sessions of  bloodshed  and  destruction. 

I  have  shown  that  the  grand  strategist  and  his  combined 
general  staff  must,  in  order  to  secure  policy,  understand  policy. 
To  understand  policy  there  must  be  a  policy,  and  in  this  Chapter 
it  is  my  intention  to  examine  the  machinery  which  produces 
policy,  a  machine  which  has  fallen  into  such  disrepair  that,  unless 
the  theory  of  traditional  politics  is  changed,  there  can  be  little 
hope  of  any  radical  change  in  the  theory  of  traditional  warfare. 
In  order  to  remedy  this  political  machine,  it  is  necessary  to  under- 
stand its  nature,  and,  as  it  is  essentially  a  human  machine,  I,  in 
this  last  Chapter,  will  turn  back  to  the  first,  in  which  I  examined 
the  forces  which  control  all  human  actions. 

In  Chapter  I.,  I  pointed  out  that  collectivism  suppresses  in- 
dividualism and  does  not  express  it,  and  that,  as  suppression  in- 
creases, the  more  eagerly  does  the  individual  seek  to  express  his 
individuality  in  the  free  and  untrammelled  exercise  of  the  hunting 
spirit.  I  will  now  examine  this  statement  from  its  political 
aspect. 

Man  desires  rest,  physical  and  mental,  but  this  ideal  is  denied 

256 


The  Peace  which  Passeth  Understanding    257 

to  him,  for,  in  order  to  live,  he  has  to  struggle.  Further,  though 
he  desires  restfulness,  he  fears  the  absolute  state  of  rest  typified  in 
death.  He  is  in  every  way  a  discontented  animal,  and  the  degree 
of  his  discontent,  his  incessant  search  after  some  unobtainable 
solvent,  is  the  measure  of  his  physical  and  mental  virility.  His 
instinct  of  self-preservation,  fear  of  death,  urges  him  to  hunt  for 
food.  In  the  woman,  the  instinct  of  racial-preservation  urges  her 
to  mate,  that  is,  to  form  with  man  a  co-operative  association 
which,  as  the  family  arises,  establishes  among  human  kind  a 
purely  natural  form  of  communism.  A  new  spirit  is  thus  evolved 
and  a  much  more  tangible  one,  it  is  the  spirit  of  the  family,  the 
restful  home  after  hunting,  and  the  only  practical  solvent  man  is 
likely  to  discover  on  earth.  From  the  family  springs  creative 
society,  that  is,  a  community  of  individuals  who  evolve  through 
self-sacrifice  and  mutual  support.  The  simple  hunting  spirit  has 
now  grown  into  a  complex,  a  hunt  after  codes  and  laws,  ideals, 
morals,  ethics  and  knowledge,  which  stabilize  the  community  in 
a  state  of  internal  restfulness.  Yet,  without  discontent,  that 
haunting  spirit  of  change,  inherent  in  the  law  of  survival,  the 
community  cannot  for  long  endure. 

From  the  family,  eventually,  evolves  the  nation,  the  head  and 
councillors  of  which  constitute  its  masculine  and  the  people  its 
feminine  elements.  Imbued  with  the  hunting  spirit,  the  king  or 
chieftain  aims,  through  his  own  activities,  to  produce  a  condition 
of  restfulness  among  his  subjects.  The  stimulus  is  fear,  fear 
arising  from  his  instinct  of  self-preservation,  fear  that,  unless  his 
people  are  well  supplied  with  material  and  mental  food,  they  will 
destroy  him ;  in  other  words,  that  they  will  hunt  him  off  his  throne. 
On  this  fear  he  forms  two  managerial  or  stabilizing  bureau- 
cracies :  an  army  to  stand  behind  his  will  and,  by  enforcing  it, 
control  the  hunting  spirit  of  the  community ;  and  a  church  to 
stand  behind  the  ideal  of  restfulness  and  control  the  mind  of  man 
by  denying  or  promising  it  this  ideal.  Later,  when  customs 
stabilize  into  rights,  a  judicial  bureaucracy  is  formed  to  administer 
these  rights  or  laws,  and,  eventually,  the  modern  state  evolves 
with  its  numerous  ministries,  offices  and  departments,  all  of  which 

17 


258  The  Reformation  of  War 

should  be  feminine  in  nature ;  that  is,  fertilized  by  the  king  and 
his  councillors,  they  should  produce  a  state  of  national  passivity 
in  which  the  dynamic  force  in  life  and  its  static  inclination  are 
balanced  by  law  and  order. 

As  governments  grow  more  and  more  complex,  we  find  that 
individual  rule — kingship,  is  replaced  by  a  collective  sway — 
proletarianism.  Nations  are  then  governed  by  small  crowds  of 
politicians  elected  to  represent  their  interests.  These  interests, 
in  a  healthy  society,  are  closely  connected  with  the  hunting  spirit 
in  all  its  forms,  the  object  of  which  is  not  only  to  preserve  in- 
dividuals and  families  but  to  render  them  contented,  that  is,  to 
supply  them  with  rest  (leisure)  as  well  as  labour.  Thus,  if  we 
examine  English  political  history,  we  find  that  formerly  Parlia- 
mentary representation  was  largely  based  on  agriculture  ;  each 
agricultural  district,  normally,  returning  as  its  member  its  most 
influential  landlord,  because,  of  all  men  in  the  district,  he  was 
the  best  suited  to  express  a  common  opinion  in  the  interests  of 
the  staple  occupation,  the  form  taken  by  the  hunting  spirit  in  his 
area. 

To-day  we  find  that  these  political  districts  or  constituencies 
are  very  similar  to  those  which  existed  a  hundred  and  fifty  years 
ago,  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  that  portion  of  the  dynamic  force  of 
life  which  constitutes  the  hunting  spirit  no  longer  seeks  its  freedom 
in  ploughing,  sowing  and  reaping,  but  in  casting,  tooling  and 
machining.  In  brief,  the  form  which  the  hunting  spirit  to-day 
takes  is  industrial  and  not  agricultural  production  and  acquisi- 
tion. What  does  this  mean  ?  It  means  that,  in  theory,  repre- 
sentation is  no  longer  based  on  the  interests  of  the  constituencies, 
but  on  the  number  of  people  within  them  who  can  be  induced  to 
vote.  It  is  theoretically  a  numerical  representation  based  on 
brute  force  and  frequently  the  brute  stupidity  of  numbers.  It  is, 
consequently,  closely  related  to  the  brute  force  theory  of  tradi- 
tional warfare.  Practically  it  is,  however,  a  great  deal  more,  for 
the  candidates  have  to  struggle  between  themselves  for  election, 
and  are,  consequently,  driven  to  every  subterfuge  in  order  to 
acquire  power ;   not  for  the  purpose  of  fostering  national  pros- 


The  Peace  which  Passeth  Understanding    259 

perity  but  as  a  weapon  to  enable  them  to  defeat  their  opposite 
numbers. 

The  question  now  arises,  where  does  this  power  reside  ?  Theo- 
retically it  resides  in  the  people,  but,  as  most  of  these  have  daily 
to  struggle  for  their  existence,  they  have  little  time  to  accumulate 
it  in  its  modern  form  of  money.  Practically,  we  find,  therefore, 
that  this  power  is  to  be  sought  for  among  those  who,  possessing 
money,  are  to  a  greater  extent  freed  from  the  above  struggle. 
From  this  we  may  assume  that  their  hunting  spirit  has  become 
subservient  to  their  inclination  to  rest,  and,  consequently,  their 
power  is  psychologically  antipathetic  to  the  interests  of  the 
multitude  upon  whom  virtually  they  are  resting,  and  on  whose 
passivity  the  stability  of  this  rest  depends.  We  find,  therefore, 
that,  to-day,  instead  of  representing  the  interests  of  the  nation, 
our  Members  of  Parliament  represent  the  prejudices  of  small 
sections  of  the  nation.  These  sections  are  deeply  imbued  with 
bureaucratic  (traditional)  tendencies,  consequently  their  object 
is  to  maintain  the  status  quo  upon  which  the  existence  of  these 
prejudices  is  based.  This  status  quo  is  founded  on  a  fear  of 
change,  and  here  we  arrive  at  that  dangerous  social  condition 
in  which  the  irresistible  force — the  hunting  spirit,  is  restricted 
and  tamped  by  the  all  but  immovable  substance — the  inertia 
of  the  governing  classes. 

We  see,  therefore,  that  to-day  representation  is  ultimately 
based  on  fear,  fear  of  a  free  expression  of  the  hunting  spirit, 
and  that,  consequently,  Members  of  Parliament  are  the  mere 
needles  and  sound-box  of  the  national  gramophone,  the  records 
of  which  are  prepared  by  the  various  contending  parties.  All 
of  these  are  controlled  by  small  self-seeking  bureaucracies, 
none  of  which  are  more  bureaucratic  than  those  obsessed  by 
socialistic  and  communistic  doctrines.  In  fact,  communism 
is  bureaucracy  standing  on  its  head,  for  communism  expects 
a  community  to  live  like  one  family :  in  theory  a  beautiful  ideal, 
but  in  practice  an  attempt  to  balance  a  pyramid  upon  its  apex. 

The  growth  of  industry,  due  to  the  general  use  of  steam-power 
during  the  last  century,   carried  with  it  a   stupendous  social 

17* 


260  The  Reformation  of  War 

revolution.  Among  civilized  nations,  manual  labour  was  re- 
placed rapidly  by  machine  work,  which,  by  increasing  output, 
increased  wealth  and  to  a  high  degree  liberated  the  worker 
from  the  serfdom  of  the  soil,  but  only  to  sell  him  into  bondage 
in  the  workshop.  In  the  manufactories  he  was  completely 
cut  off  from  his  natural  activities  ;  the  changing  phases  of  nature 
which  once  surrounded  him  in  the  fields  being  replaced  by  a 
grim  monotonous  routine  which  enslaved  him  to  the  machines 
the  brain  of  man  had  designed.  The  result  of  this  suppression 
of  his  natural  instincts  by  machine-power  tamped  down  his 
hunting  spirit,  until,  towards  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth 
century,  a  series  of  social  explosions  occurred  and  have  never 
ceased  their  repercussion.  When  internal  vents  could  not  be 
found,  if  we  examine  the  history  of  this  period,  we  shall  find  a 
steady  growth  of  warlike  fervour  in  the  nations  which  had 
benefited  most  from  industry.  From  the  Crimea  onwards, 
Great  Britain  is  engaged  in  a  series  of  small  wars ;  France 
builds  up  a  great  colonial  empire,  and  Germany  rapidly  grows 
intoxicated  on  the  dream  of  world  dominion.  Though  many 
causes  were  at  work,  in  my  opinion,  the  leading  cause  of  this 
activity  was  the  suppression  of  the  hunting  instinct  in  man  due 
to  the  tamping  down  of  the  social  revolution  created  by  the 
general  adoption  of  steam  as  a  motive  power. 

The  social  and  political  recoil  of  this  commercial  and  war- 
like fervour,  generically  may  be  termed  "  pacifism."  The 
commercial  pacifist  dreaded  social  disturbance  as  it  would  affect 
his  personal  wealth,  and  the  political  pacifist  dreaded  foreign 
wars  as  they  would  upset  the  stability  of  his  political  prejudices. 
From  this  fervour  and  its  recoil  developed  two  great  political 
schools  of  thought — the  war-lovers  and  the  peace-lovers,  which 
in  all  civilized  countries,  during  the  last  fifty  years,  have  formed 
the  centrifugal  and  centripetal  forces  in  politics.  One  quantity 
they  held  in  common,  namely,  their  power  was  based  on  wealth. 

Out  of  the  friction  engendered  by  these  two  opposite  schools, 
emerged  a  new  political  group — the  under-dog,  the  eventual 
Socialist   party.     Outwardly   its   policy    is    pacific ;    but   why, 


The  Peace  which  Passeth  Understanding    261 

since    without    struggling    it    cannot    survive  ?     Because,    by 
proclaiming  foreign  wars  evil,   it  aspires  not  only  to  weaken 
military   power   and   so   undermine   the   stability   of   domestic 
peace,  but  also  simultaneously  to  dam  up  within  the  country 
itself  the  hunting  spirit  of  the  people,  which,  finding  no  escape 
for  its  activities  in  foreign  wars,  will  explode  into  wars  of  purga- 
tion and  destroy  all  traditional  government.     In  other  words, 
the  aim  of  the  socialist  is  to  do  away  with  ordered  force  so  that 
he  may  employ  disorder  as  a  force  for  his  own  immediate  benefit. 
In  character,  socialism  is  atavistic,  for  it  does   not  so  much 
attempt  to  reform  as  to  deform,  it  does  not  attempt  to  progress 
to  a  condition  in  advance  of  the  existing  one,  but  to  retrogress 
to  a  condition  so  far  behind  it  that  it  appears  totally  different 
from  it  in  character.     Socialism  is  not  creative ;  it  is  imitative,  it 
is  a  social  throw-back.     To  the  socialist  the  past  is  far  distant, 
consequently  simple  and  beautiful,  for  its  jagged  edges  cannot  be 
seen  and  its  form  glows  pink  through  the  rays  of  the  setting  sun 
of  history.     Yet,  in  spite  of  this  predilection  for  the  mythology 
of  Eden,   socialism   being  primitive  is  intensely  human ;   con- 
sequently,   within    its   barbarous    body    palpitates   a    sentient 
heart.     Though  impelled  to  use  brute  force  in  order  to  reinstate 
the  baboon,  the  socialist  dreams  of  an  eventual  Paradise,  wherein 
there  is  neither  labour  nor  competition,  and  where  love,  meat  and 
drink  are  free  and  the  sky  is  ever  blue,  and  the  benches  soft  to  lie 
upon — a  veritable  Fragonard  picture  dreamt  of  in  a  glue  factory. 
As  the  separation   of  the  two  great   political  parties,   the 
Progressives  and  the  Statists,  from  the  instincts  and  interests 
of   the   people  widens,   the    Socialist,    or    retrogressive    party, 
grows  in  strength,  and,  being  the  recoil,  or  enemy  of  both  parties, 
it  compels  both  to  turn  from  national  policy  to  party  salva- 
tion.    In   place   of   attempting   to   secure   the   nation   against 
foreign    attack — ethical,    economic,    or    military,  both    parties 
attempt  to  maintain  civil  tranquillity,  not  in  order  to  secure 
prosperity  but  to  secure  their  own  existence,  which  is  based  on 
the  common  foundation  of  wealth.     To  illustrate  this  I  will 
turn  to  history. 


262  The  Reformation  of  War 

From  the  year  1588  to  1815,  English  foreign  policy,  with  few 
exceptions,  was  based  on  the  principle  of  the  balance  of  power, 
which  formed  the  expression  of  political  brute  force  against  all 
would-be  disturbers  of  the  world's  peace.  From  1821  to  1864 
the  introduction  and  growth  of  railways  takes  place.  Coinci- 
dental with  the  industrial  development  which  followed  is  the 
falling  off  in  the  vigour  of  this  policy,  until,  in  1864,  the  British 
Government,  headed  by  Mr.  Gladstone,  tore  up  their  treaty 
agreements  with  Denmark  and  so  permitted  Prussia  to  violate 
the  balance  of  power  in  Europe. 

The  tigress  having  tasted  blood  and  finding  the  inhabitants 
of  neighbouring  lands  succulent  meat,  two  years  later  rends 
Austria,  and  four  years  later  France  falls  a  victim  to  her  lust. 
Meanwhile  England  stands  still  and  does  nothing.  This  results 
in  the  German  Empire  becoming  the  supreme  military  power 
in  Europe ;  in  fact  Germany  henceforth  is  dictator  of  continental 
wars.  What  has  really  happened  ?  The  German  hunting  spirit 
has  found  a  vent,  and  rushing  outwards,  seeks  to  secure  internal 
peace  by  the  search  after  unattackable  frontiers.  As  within 
the  country  domestic  tranquillity  stabilizes,  prosperity  increases 
and  commerce  demands  economic  frontiers.  To  be  secure, 
they  must  be  made  unattackable,  consequently  Germany  dreams 
of  the  command  of  the  seas.  She  must  create  a  supreme  navy 
to  add  it  to  her  supreme  army.  The  child  begotten  of  these 
two  monsters,  as  has  always  been  the  case  in  the  past,  is  world 
dominion  ;  and  for  Germany  the  only  obstacle  on  her  road 
to  brigandage  is  British  supremacy  at  sea. 

I  cannot  here  enter  into  the  development  of  world  politics 
between  the  years  1871  and  1914,  for  this  is  outside  the  scope 
of  this  book.  All  I  intend  doing  it  to  summarize  the  means 
open  to  Germany  in  order  to  realize  her  dream.  To  reduce 
Great  Britain  to  the  position  of  a  second-rate  power,  three 
lines  of  attack  could  be  followed  : 

(i.)  Economic  expansion  which,  by  degrees,  would  destroy 
the  British  markets. 


The  Peace  which  Passeth  Understanding    263 

(ii.)  Direct  naval  attack  which,  if  successful,  would  place 
Great  Britain  at  her  mercy. 

(hi.)  Military  action  on  the  continent  which  would  enable 
her  to  absorb  Holland,  Belgium,  North-Eastern  France 
and  the  French  Colonies,  and  gain  economic  control  of 
Austria,  the  Balkans  and  the  Turkish  Empire. 

The  first  was  unlikely  to  prove  successful  unless  guaranteed 
by  supremacy  at  sea,  besides  Russia  was  a  rapidly  growing 
menace.  The  second  was  most  difficult,  for,  though  a  great 
navy  could  be  created,  the  geographical  position  of  the  German 
naval  bases  was  unpropitious  to  decisive  naval  action  on  tradi- 
tional lines.  Had  Germany,  in  1900,  appreciated  the  powers 
of  the  submarine,  she  might  very  easily  have  won  the  war  at 
sea  in  19 14.  The  third  was  not  only  the  traditional  method 
employed  by  Germany  since  1864  and,  consequently,  the  upmost 
thought  in  the  German  mind,  but  it  offered  the  greatest  possibili- 
ties. If  France  could  be  annihilated  in  six  or  eight  weeks  then 
the  war  would  be  won,  and  any  obstruction  on  the  part  of  the 
British  fleet  arising  later  on  would  at  most  but  present  a  minor 
problem,  and,  as  we  know  to-day,  would  have  been  solved  by 
the  underwater  attack  on  our  overseas  trade.  The  war  won, 
twenty  years  of  Germanic  internal  prosperity  would  have 
followed,  which  would  either  have  enabled  Germany  to  annihi- 
late the  British  Empire  by  economic  pressure  or  to  have  attacked 
it  successfully  by  naval  action.  With  the  destruction  of  the 
British  Empire,  for  its  period,  the  German  dream  of  world 
dominion  would  have  been  realized. 

From  the  opening  of  the  present  century  until  the  year 
1914,  only  pretexts  of  war  are  to  be  discovered,  for  the  causes 
had  long  since  taken  root.  The  nature  of  the  war  which 
followed  is  not  to  be  sought  in  these  causes  but  in  their  effects, 
and  above  all  in  the  peace  terms  which  followed  the  cessation 
of  hostilities.  In  brief,  what  were  these  terms  ?  Not  the 
establishment  of  a  higher  prosperity  than  that  which  existed 
before  the  war,  but  the  destruction  of  Germany  as  a  civilized 


264  The  Reformation  of  War 

power,  because  Germany  had  outlawed  herself  in  the  eyes  of 
mankind  by  attempting  to  gain  dominion  over  the  world.  In 
place  of  reinstating  her  in  a  position  which  economically  would 
have  benefited  the  world,  a  course  which  would  undoubtedly 
have  been  followed  had  the  war  originated  solely  from  an  economic 
cause,  the  signatories  of  the  treaty  of  Versailles  attempted  to 
assassinate  her,  for  had  she  not  sought  to  steal  the  very  souls 
of  the  nations  of  the  world  in  order  to  dominate  them  by  her 
"  Kultur  "  and  to  enslave  them  to  her  will?  For  such  a  crime 
there  can  be  but  one  fitting  punishment — death.  Unfortunately 
for  the  signatories,  however  just  may  have  been  their  indigna- 
tion, nations  of  sixty-five  million  souls  cannot  be  exterminated ; 
further,  it  is  foolish  to  attempt  such  an  action  even  on  paper, 
since  it  is  not  their  bodies  which  have  offended  but  their  spirits. 
The  signatories  were,  however,  acting  on  well-defined  traditional 
lines.  Their  own  power  was  based  on  wealth,  consequently 
they  attempted  to  murder  the  German  nation  by  cutting  off 
its  economic  means  of  existence.  By  so  doing,  they  inflicted  a 
wound  on  the  body  of  the  world  which  if  unstaunched  will 
bleed  this  body  white. 

Whatever  may  have  been  the  conditions  in  which  the  belli- 
gerents were  labouring  during  the  war,  one  fact  is  certain,  namely, 
that  on  November  n,  1918,  they  had  saved  their  souls,  conse- 
quently any  succeeding  attempt  to  impair  the  body  of  the  world 
was  an  act  of  madness,  for  the  world-soul  has  to  inhabit  this  body. 
The  mistake  made  was  the  Armistice  itself,  for  a  soul  is  attacked 
by  a  soul,  and  though  the  German  body  had  been  defeated  her 
soul  remained  intact,  because  war  was  never  carried  into  her 
country  and  her  spirit  purified  by  terror  and  the  visible  signs  of 
complete  defeat,  namely,  military  occupation.  From  this  mistake 
will  originate  most  of  the  evils  of  the  present  age.  I  will  now 
turn  to  another  aspect  of  this  subject. 

The  final  victory  of  the  Allies,  in  November,  1918,  was  so 
stupendous  an  event  that  it  is  apt  to  obscure  the  main  issue  of 
over  four  years  of  war,  which  was  not  the  physical  defeat  of 
Germany,    but   the   destruction   of   the   world   outlook — social, 


The  Peace  which  Passeth  Understanding    265 

political  and  military,  as  it  was  accepted  by  all  civilized  nations 
before  the  outbreak  of  the  war.  So  all-embracing  was  this 
cataclysm  that,  during  the  years  immediately  following  the  cessa- 
tion of  hostilities,  no  other  condition  could  have  been  possible 
save  that  of  a  world-wide  revolution,  the  intensity  of  which  can 
better  be  gauged  from  the  changes  which  have  taken  place  in 
ideas  than  from  the  quantity  of  blood  spilt.  These  changes  are 
still  gaining  impetus,  and,  in  the  vortex  which  is  sucking  down 
old  institutions  and  belching  up  new  ones,  the  political  forces 
must  take  their  place. 

The  Great  War  of  1914-18  was  not  waged  to  end  war  but  to 
maintain  the  liberties  of  nations,  so  that  they  might  continue  to 
struggle  one  with  another  and  in  the  process  refine  their  respective 
natures.  A  war  to  end  war  is  an  absurdity,  just  as  a  peace  to  end 
peace  is  an  absurdity ;  both  are  the  cries  of  maniacs  which  end 
nothing  except  common-sense.  What,  however,  the  Great  War 
did  end  was  the  reality  of  19 14 ;  it  dematerialized  this  condition, 
which,  to-day,  stalks  the  world  a  giant  phantom  palsying  our 
minds. 

The  Devil  took  Christ  into  a  high  mountain  and  showed  to 
him  all  the  kingdoms  of  the  world,  saying  :  "  All  this  power  will  I 
give  you  if  you  will  fall  down  and  worship  me  "  ;  and  Christ  said  : 
"  Get  thee  behind  me,  Satan."  To-day  the  Devil  of  1914  takes 
us  up  the  blasted  pinnacle  of  hope  left  standing  by  the  war,  and 
shows  to  us  the  world  as  it  was  before  the  war  destroyed  it,  and 
he  says  :  "  All  this  splendour  and  contentedness  and  wealth  will 
I  return  to  you  if  you  will  but  fall  down  and  worship  me."  To 
this  the  politician  answers  :  "  Thank  you  very  much,"  and  then 
goes  on  hammering  at  Germany  and  Russia,  one  a  sick  and  the 
other  a  demented  nation ;  the  outrage  is  brutal,  and  the  Devil  of 
1914  rubs  his  hands  and  smiles. 

Yet  there  is  still  a  Christ  in  this  world — the  spirit  of  humanity, 
which  is  audibly  whispering :  "  Get  thee  behind  me,  Satan  ...  we 
will  have  none  of  these  past  wonders,  because  they  are  but  phan- 
toms of  things  dead,  they  are  soulless  and  void  of  salvation." 

The  world  of  1914  has  been  purified  by  fire ;  to-day  this  world 


266  The  Reformation  of  War 

is  a  better  world|than  it  ever  was  before,  for  it  has  vanquished  the 
greatest  of  all  evils — the  spiritual  enchainment  of  liberty.  Cer- 
tainly it  is  a  poorer  world,  yet  "  Blessed  be  ye  poor,"  for  poverty 
means  struggle,  and  struggle  means  self-sacrifice,  and  self-sacrifice 
means  progress ;  the  stepping  forward  on  our  dead-selves  to 
better  things,  and  progress,  that  is  rational  thought,  is  the  road  to 
Paradise. 

The  outstanding  result  of  the  Great  War  was  a  moral  revolu- 
tion. The  new  spirit,  blind  as  it  yet  is,  like  a  second  Samson  has 
seized  the  pillars  of  the  temple  of  traditions,  and  prejudices  and 
interests  have  been  scattered  to  the  ground.  Those  who  are 
engulfed  in  this  cataclysm  see  nothing  but  evil,  but  those  who 
stand  apart  from  it  see  nothing  but  good. 

Much  debris  has  fallen  in  Russia  and  many  have  been  en- 
tombed, because,  of  all  civilized  nations,  Russia  was  the  most 
traditionally  unprogressive  and  ignorant,  and  the  ignorant 
always  suffer  most.  In  Russia  the  revolution  destroyed  1914^0 
that  it  might  create  a  better  nation ;  in  England  the  revolution  set 
out  to  reform  1914,  and  the  progress  already  made  is  so  stupendous 
that,  to  most  people,  it  is  invisible,  yet  the  Russian  revolution  has 
been  but  a  miasmal  zephyr  compared  to  the  invigorating  hurri- 
cane which  has  swept  the  British  Empire  from  end  to  end. 

Say  you,  that  discontent  stalks  broadly  through  the  daylight  ? 
Then,  answer  I  yet  again,  discontent  is  the  quintessence  of  mental 
youth,  it  is  the  surest  sign  of  health  since  it  is  the  visible  sign  of 
activity.  Anarchy  more  often  than  not  is  terrible,  yet  there  is 
something  worse — communism,  or  the  slow  asphyxiation  of  the 
human  soul  by  a  creeping,  drivelling  idiocy.  Anarchy  is,  after 
all,  nothing  but  brutal  healthfulness ;  we  do  not  want  anarchy,  but 
of  all  things  precious  is  the  force  which  creates  it,  and  it  is  this 
force,  to-day  dancing  drunkenly,  which  we  must  divert  towards 
the  reconstruction  of  the  world. 

I  cannot  forbear  quoting  one  small  example  of  this  liberty 
abroad.  We  are  told  by  the  moralists  of  1914  that  England  is  a 
land  of  corruption  and  that  virtue  has  passed  along  her  way. 
We  are  told  that  never  were  the  divorce  courts  so  full  and  that, 


The  Peace  which  Passeth  Understanding    267 

consequently,  never  have  morals  been  so  low.  What  sophistry  ! 
I  cannot  vouch  for  the  numbers  of  the  unhappily  married,  but  I 
can  vouch  for  this,  that  unhappiness  is  not  a  virtue,  that  happiness 
is,  and  that  those  who  cannot  find  happiness  in  wedlock  show  not 
only  common-sense  but  virtue  in  seeking  divorce,  for  marriage 
was  instituted  for  man  and  not  man  for  marriage.  So  also  with 
each  of  the  great  changes,  the  seeking  of  liberation  from  1914 
ideals  is,  by  the  traditional  school  of  thought,  classed  as  a  vice, 
simply  because  liberty  will  not  and  cannot  stand  still ;  for  if  it 
were  able  to  do  so  it  would  cease  to  be  liberty,  and  instead  would 
be  slavery,  nothing  more  and  nothing  less. 

Socialism,  which  has  been  one  of  the  great  forces  since  1848, 
has  also  divorced  many  of  its  pre-war  preposterous  traditions ; 
it  too  has  been  refined  by  war ;  the  lanky  good  has  filled  out 
and  has  become  much  more  human  in  form,  while  the  retrograde 
bad  has  become  still  more  deformed,  if  only  by  comparison.  It  is 
becoming  idiotic,  and  idiotic  through  dotage,  which  is  a  good  sign, 
as  this  shows  that  it  is  nearing  its  end. 

Except  in  Russia,  socialism  has,  to  a  very  considerable  extent, 
lost  its  pre-war  shortsightedness.  Then  there  was  much  talk  of 
maximum  and  minimum  incomes,  but  since,  during  the  war,  so 
many  socialists  remained  at  home  and  amassed  fortunes,  this 
topic  of  conversation  has  been  quietly  dropped.  The  present 
trouble  is  that  the  bad  in  the  old  socialism  is  still  in  a  state  of  de- 
composition ;  consequently,  it  stinks,  but  this  should  not  frighten 
us,  for  again  it  is  a  good  sign,  for  a  decomposing  body  is  one  which, 
if  given  fresh  air  above  ground,  will  rapidly  fall  to  dust. 

One  of  the  great  backwashes  of  the  Great  War  was  the  rapid 
spread  of  communistic  theories  and  action.  Brotherly  love  was 
the  natural  recoil  of  the  horrors  of  traditional  slaughter.  For 
over  four  years  men  had  been  cutting  each  other's  throats ;  conse- 
quently, once  this  madness  was  over,  the  pendulum  of  life  swung 
in  the  opposite  direction,  and  universal  kissing,  a  most  disgusting 
operation,  was  proclaimed  the  goal  of  all  progress. 

Out  of  Russian  military  chaos  and  bureaucratic  corruption 
stealthily  crept  revolution,  which,  in  March,  1917,  gathered  speed 


268  The  Reformation  of  War 

as  the  railways  broke  down.  It  opened  almost  like  a  school  rag. 
On  March  16,  one  soldier  said  to  General  Knox  :*  "  We  have 
suffered  300  years  of  slavery,  you  cannot  grudge  us  a  single  week 
of  holiday."  Then  discipline  gave  way.  In  June,  Kerenski  calls 
upon  the  army,  "  fortified  by  the  strength  and  spirit  of  the  Revolu- 
tion, to  take  the  offensive."  The  men  in  some  units  say  :  "  We 
will  attack,  but  if  we  fail,  we  will  kill  the  Corps  Staff,"  while  others 
pin  up  on  their  barrack  doors :  "  Handshaking  is  abolished  in  hot 
weather."  Lenin  issues  an  order  to  his  own  party  which  ends  : 
"  I  demand,  I  beg,  I  hope  that  this  order  will  be  carried  out,"  and 
General  Knox  adds  :  "  Damned  ass  !  " 

All  sense  of  humour  having  been  lost,  madness  supervenes, 
physical  and  material  disorder  create  mental  and  moral  disorder 
— all  go  mad. 

"  The  thieves  of  Moscow  had  a  meeting  outside  the  town,  and 
the  Chief  of  Police  showed  his  human  sympathy  by  attending.  It  is 
said  that  a  unanimous  resolution  was  passed  to  refrain  from  stealing 
for  two  days  '  in  honour  of  the  sun  of  freedom  !  ' 

"  Similarly  the  deserters  met  in  a  conference  at  Odessa,  and  the 
Commander-in-Chief  was  received  with  acclamation  ! 

"  In  Petrograd,  children  have  been  seen  parading  with  banners 
inscribed  :     '  Down   with   parental  yoke  !  '  " 

Lastly,  out  of  madness  howls  the  beast ;  a  wolfish  spirit  of  lust 
and  cruelty  sweeps  over  the  maniacs. 

At  Kalusz  "  eye-witnesses  related  that  forty  to  fifty  men  in 
turn  outraged  old  women  of  seventy.  .  .  .  The  retiring  Germans 
bombarded  the  town,  but  the  noise  of  the  bombardment  was 
literally  drowned  by  the  cries  of  women.  .  .  .  Soldiers  stripped 
little  girls  naked  .  .  .  and  one  after  another,  there  on  the  street, 
violated  the  children  and  then  cut  them  to  pieces." 

Thus  do  we  see  emerge,  from  the  green  leaves  of  the  "  little 
holiday,"  the  red  slug  of  Bolshevism,  which  has  slimed  Russia 
with  a  bestiality  which  puts  to  blush  the  shame  of  Sodom  and 
Gomorrah  ;  once  the  cities  of  the  plain,  but,  in  1917,  rearisen 
more  monstrous  still  as  Moscow  and  Petrograd. 

*  The  British  Military  Attache  at  Petrograd.  The  following  quotations 
are  taken  from  his  book,  "  With  the  Russian  Army,  1914-1917." 


The  Peace  which  Passeth  Understanding    269 

We  rub  our  eyes  and  can  but  mutter  with  Isaiah  :  "  We  grope 
for  the  wall  like  the  blind,  and  we  grope  as  if  we  had  no  eyes  ;  we 
stumble  at  noonday  as  in  the  night ;  we  are  in  desolate  places  as 
dead  men."  Yet  this  orgy  of  blood  was  but  the  curtain-raiser  to 
a  still  more  demented  scene,  for  the  madness  of  anarchy  was 
about  to  be  replaced  by  the  idiocy  of  communism,  which,  in  1918 
and  1919,  swept  over  the  world  like  a  leprous  plague. 

First,  I  will  examine  economic  communism — the  theory  held 
by  Lenin  ;  and  secondly,  ethical  communism — the  theory  held 
by  President  Wilson. 

The  economic  communist  says  :  Huge  money  capitals  are  an 
evil  and  are  a  result  of  competition.  If  every  man  possesses  a 
million  pounds  the  world  is  no  better  off  than  if  every  man  pos- 
sessed one  penny.  Lenin  then  says  :  But  why  should  he  possess 
a  penny  ;  if  you  agree  to  a  penny,  why  not  to  twopence,  a  shilling 
and  eventually  back  to  the  million  ?  I  shall,  therefore,  destroy 
all  capital,  so  that,  as  no  one  will  be  allowed  to  possess  capital,  all 
forced  competition  will  disappear. 

The  ethical  communist  says  :  Huge  mental  capitals  are  an  evil 
and  are  the  result  of  competing  minds.  If  every  man  possesses 
high  ability  the  world  is  no  better  off  than  if  every  man  possessed 
a  low  ability.  What  does  President  Wilson  say  ?  He  says, 
somewhat  vaguely,  that  every  nation  has  a  right  of  self-determina- 
tion, or,  in  other  words,  that  a  highly  cultured  nation  is  of  no 
greater  value  to  humanity  than  one  without  any  culture  at  all, 
ergo,  culture,  or  mental  and  moral  capital,  should  be  abolished. 

Darwin,  some  sixty  years  ago,  did  his  utmost  to  prove  that 
because  of  competition  (the  struggle  for  existence)  from  the  apt 
evolved  the  man.  If  he  is  right,  then  lack  of  competition  will 
mean  that  from  man  will  devolve  the  ape.  Is  he  right  ?  I,  for 
one,  do  not  know,  but  I  know  this  :  that  in  this  world  there  is  no 
equality ;  in  place  there  is  incessant  variety  ;  consequently,  to  talk 
of  no  one  nation  being  allowed  (which  presupposes  some  om- 
nipotent power)  to  do  this  or  that  is  as  absurd  as  the  search  after 
the  philosopher's  stone.  Lenin  has  searched  for  it,  and  the  result 
has  been  called  "  a  bloody  baboonery."     President  Wilson  has 


270  The  Reformation  of  War 

searched  for  it,  and  the  results  up  to  date  are  none  too  en- 
couraging. 

The  fourteen  points  and  the  League  of  Nations  ruined  the 
peace  treaty,  because  they  were  based  on  sublime  nonsense  and 
not  on  common-sense,  which  includes  human  nature.  The 
terms  of  the  Armistice  based  on  the  fourteen  points  proclaimed 
the  Brotherhood  of  Man,  and  were  proffered  to  the  Germans 
when  friend  and  foe,  the  eternal  brothers,  were  still  gazing 
at  each  other  through  a  haze  of  blood  which  proved  the  unreality 
of  this  amiable  dream.  The  Germans,  ever  foolish  in  diplomacy, 
swallowed  the  fourteen  points  hook  and  all.  The  Allies  thereupon 
repudiated  the  fourteen  points  and  drove  the  gaff  of  the  Treaty 
of  Versailles  through  the  German  skin.  "  The  German  com- 
mentators," says  Mr.  Keynes,  "  had  little  difficulty  in  showing 
that  the  draft  Treaty  constituted  a  breach  of  engagements  and 
of  international  morality  comparable  with  their  own  offences 
in  the  invasion  of  Belgium."*  Very  true,  but  just  as,  in  1914, 
the  Germans  tore  up  their  treaty  because  self-preservation  de- 
manded that  their  armies  must  advance  through  Belgium, 
so,  in  1 91 9,  the  Allies  tore  up  their  Armistice  Terms  because 
instinctively  they  felt  that  Germany  had  not  as  yet  felt  the 
spiritual  smart  of  defeat  and  must  do  so.  The  blunder  was  the 
Armistice,  the  black  day  in  European  history.  The  fourteen 
points  were  all  kisses  ;  life  is  not  made  up  of  kisses  alone,  and  if 
it  were  the  world  would  be  a  very  dull  place  to  live  in.  This 
every  cinema  play  reveals,  for  the  hero  who  kisses  has  always 
got  a  gun  in  his  pocket  for  the  other  kisser,  the  villain.  The 
terms  of  the  Armistice  were  not  true  to  human  nature,  the  cinema 
generally  is.  If  you  are  out  to  kiss  make  sure  you  have  a  revolver, 
for  kisses  and  revolvers  are  near  related  to  the  eternal  forces  in  life 
— love  and  fear.  President  Wilson  was  all  love,  the  Allies  were 
all  fear,  and  until  these  two  wed,  Europe  will  continue  in  a  turmoil. 

Under  the  influence  of  the  fear  of  Germany  in  the  future, 
the  Allies  attempted  to  reconstruct  Europe  on  such  lines  that 
Germany  would  for  years  to  come  be  rendered  impotent.     To 

*  "The  Economic  Consequences  of  the  Peace,"  J.  M.  Keynes,  C.B.,  p.  59. 


The  Peace  which  Passeth  Understanding    271 

accomplish  this  they  employed  the  tool  of  self-determination, 
not  because  they  believed  in  kisses,  but  because,  for  their  purpose, 
they  found  it  possessed  a  very  sharp  edge. 

I  cannot  here  enter  into  the  ramifications  of  this  reconstruction, 
which  mediae valized  a  great  part  of  Europe,  splitting  up  nations 
according  to  weight  of  ignorant  numbers  irrespective  of  their 
culture  and  fitness  for  independence  and  sovereignty.  Instead, 
I  intend  examining  four  great  national  influences — British, 
French,  German  and  Slavonic,  and  show  that  from  them,  in  all 
probability,  will  be  engendered  the  next  great  European  war. 

In  order  to  understand  future  international  war  tendencies, 
the  question  of  security  of  frontiers  must  never  be  lost  sight  of. 
Frontiers  in  nature  are  not  only  military  but  also  economic 
and  sometimes  ethical.  In  1914,  Germany's  military  might 
was  based  on  her  economic  security,  consequently,  if  Germany 
could,  by  military  force,  extend  her  economic  frontiers  to  the  sea 
coasts  of  other  nations  it  would  have  endowed  her  with  a  world 
supremacy,  for  then,  at  will,  she  could  either  have  attacked 
other  nations  militarily  or  forced  them  to  economic  surrender. 

The  British  Empire  stood  in  the  way,  and  at  the  end  of  the  war, 
though  our  Imperial  resources  had  been  bled  white,  the  economic 
frontiers  of  the  Empire  remained  intact.  The  French  frontiers, 
which,  in  nature,  were  military,  were,  in  1914,  overrun  for  the 
fourth  time  in  a  hundred  years  ;  consequently,  once  the  Armistice 
was  concluded,  the  first  and  all-important  problem  which  con- 
fronted France  was  her  future  frontier  security.  Physically, 
Germany  could  not  be  erased  from  the  map  of  Europe,  but 
economically  she  could  be  ruined,  and  the  instrument  to  accom- 
plish her  destruction  was  President  Wilson's  principle  of  self- 
determination,  and,  as  the  majority  of  effaced  nations  were  of 
Slav  blood,  the  economic  ruin  of  Germany  could  only  be  accom- 
plished by  the  resurrection  and  creation  of  moribund  and  effete 
Slavonic  States,  such  as  the  Baltic  States,  Poland,  Czecho- 
slovakia and  Jugo-Slavia. 

This  breaking  up  of  German  economic  prosperity,  as  well  as 
the  general  Balkanization  of  large  tracts  of  Europe,  was  a  direct 


272  The  Reformation  of  War 

blow  against  British  trade.  Depending  on  her  overseas  commerce 
and  not  being  self-supporting,  British  policy  demands  a  prosperous 
and  progressive  Europe  which  carries  with  it  military  strength. 
France,  being  a  self-supporting  country,  demands  military  weak- 
ness on  the  part  of  the  rest  of  Europe,  and,  consequently,  economic 
poverty,  which  can  best  be  guaranteed  by  social  disorder.  Hence 
the  present  wrangle  between  Great  Britain  and  France. 

The  nature  of  this  problem  is,  however,  a  more  complex 
one  than  at  first  meets  the  eye.  The  Slavonic  races  are  of  a  low 
culture  and  possess  an  oriental  temperament.  In  Russia  they 
have  proved  themselves  quite  unfit  to  govern.  Their  main 
power,  however,  is  to  be  looked  for  in  the  probable  enormous 
increase  in  their  population  during  the  next  two  generations. 
What  does  this  mean  ?  It  means  either  internal  disorder  or 
foreign  invasion  in  order  to  guarantee  domestic  tranquillity. 
Out  of  this  guarantee  will  once  again  evolve  that  search  after 
an  unattackable  frontier,  which  carries  with  it  the  idea  of  world 
dominion.  For  the  time  being  Germany  may  attempt  to  exploit 
Russia,  but  sooner  or  later  the  hunting  spirit  in  Russia  will  seek 
a  vent,  and  the  lines  of  least  resistance  run  westwards  to  the  Baltic, 
the  North  Sea,  the  Atlantic  and  the  Mediterranean.  For  self- 
preservation  the  nations  of  Europe  will  coalesce  against  the 
Slav,  and  the  most  probable  alliance,  in  order  to  maintain  the 
balance  of  power,  is  that  of  Germany,  France  and  Great  Britain. 
Should  war  break  out,  Germany  will  receive  the  first  shock,  and 
if  she  militarily  is  weak  France  and  Great  Britain  will  have  to 
bear  the  brunt  of  the  contest.  We  see,  therefore,  that  a  weak 
Germany  is  but  an  ephemeral  advantage  to  France,  as  well  as 
being  a  cause  of  friction  between  France  and  England.  The 
date  of  this  next  great  war,  in  my  opinion,  will  depend  on  the 
revival  of  Russia,  and  it  is  almost  certain  to  be  preceded  by  wars 
between  the  new  "  Balkan  "  states  created  by  the  Treaty  of 
Versailles. 

Since  the  ratification  of  this  treaty,  Europe  has  been  faced  by 
two  problems — how  to  enforce  its  terms  and  how  to  wriggle  out 
of  enforcing  them.     The  first  problem  is  the  French  problem 


The  Peace  which  Passeth  Understanding    273 

and  the  second  the  British.  While  these  problems  were  being 
wrangled  over,  the  United  States  of  America,  scared  by  a  phantom 
war  with  Japan  and  engaged  on  an  enormous  naval  expansion 
of  an  obsolescent  type  of  warship,  called  together  a  disarmament 
conference  at  Washington,  the  aim  of  which  appears  to  have  been, 
not  to  guarantee  peace  but  to  manoeuvre  into  a  good  position  for 
the  next  war.  If  the  British  Alliance  with  Japan  could  be 
severed,  Japanese  naval  strength  could  be  weakened  ;  if  European 
naval  power  could  be  reduced,  American  economic  prosperity 
could  be  better  guaranteed. 

England,  with  an  exceptional  lack  of  foresight,  fell  into  the 
economic  trap.  She  severed  her  alliance  with  Japan,  which, 
in  the  future,  might  well  prove  a  decisive  requirement  in  a  war 
against  Russia,  and,  smarting  from  her  recent  trade  losses,  sang 
chorus  to  the  United  States'  incantation  against  the  submarine. 
France  played  her  part  with  marked  astuteness  ;  what  apparently 
she  wanted  was  supremacy  of  the  air,  for,  though  her  aircraft 
are,  at  any  time  in  the  near  future,  unlikely  to  be  able  to  attack 
America,  with  a  supremely  powerful  air  force  she  can  enforce 
her  policy  on  two  thirds  of  Europe.  She  made  a  great  fuss 
over  the  capital  ship,  with  her  tongue  well  in  her  cheek  ;  she  made 
a  greater  fuss  over  the  submarine,  so  great  that  the  aeroplane 
remained  undiscussed.  The  United  States  won  the  rubber, 
but  France  won  on  points  and  Great  Britain  was  handed  the  baby. 

Once  again  at  Genoa,  in  the  spring  of  1922,  the  wrangle  is 
reopened.  The  United  States,  having  gained  their  point  at  Wash- 
ington, very  wisely  take  no  part  in  the  hubbub.  The  wrangle 
is  purely  an  economic  one.  The  problem  is  how  to  make  plus 
and  minus  agree,  plus  being  the  British  policy  and  minus  the 
French.  But  they  cannot  possibly  agree  ;  then  one  of  the  two  will 
have  to  be  abandoned,  and  the  point  now  arises  which  ? 

If  a  pugilist  has  an  argument  with  a  wealthy  shopkeeper, 
should  the  point  under  dispute  lead  to  blows,  which  of  the  two 
will  win  ?  The  answer  is  self-evident — the  prize-fighter.  To-day 
England  possesses  a  smaller  army  than  she  did  in  1914,  a  one- 
power  navy,  and  an  air  force  of  thirty-five  squadrons.     France 

18 


274  The  Reformation  of  War 

possesses  a  stronger  army  than  she  did  before  the  war,  a  strong 
navy,  and  she  is  aiming  at  an  air  force  of  220  squadrons.  In 
the  British  Army  there  are  four  battalions  of  tanks  and  in  the 
French  between  thirty  and  forty.  I  will  now  leave  it  to  the 
reader  to  decide  who  is  the  shopkeeper  and  who  the  pugilist  ? 

I  do  not  for  a  moment  accuse  France  of  any  wish  to  go  to 
war  with  England,  for  the  French  are  at  heart  a  peace-loving 
nation  and  the  French  love  peace  so  ardently  that  they  have 
every  intention  of  safeguarding  themselves  against  war.  But 
I  cannot  obscure  from  my  mind  the  fact  that  as  a  pugilist  can 
always  threaten,  that  is  morally  attack,  a  shopkeeper,  British 
diplomacy  must  suffer  unless  it  is  backed  by  military  force. 

Now  that  I  have  shown  that  the  idea  of  a  war  to  end  war 
is  pure  bunkum,  and  that  Europe  to-day  is  seething  with  warlike 
problems,  I  intend  to  return  to  the  question  of  political  reform, 
for  without  this  we,  as  a  nation,  shall  never  succeed  in  getting 
a  policy,  and,  unless  we  have  a  policy,  our  fighting  forces,  upon 
which  ultimately  the  security  of  our  prosperity  depends,  will  be 
comparable  to  a  watch  without  a  mainspring. 

If  the  deductions  I  have  now  made  in  this  Chapter  are  in  any 
way  correct,  then  it  would  appear  that  the  last  war,  in  place 
of  being  a  war  which  will  end  war,  will,  like  most  other  wars 
which  have  preceded  it,  merely  have  reaped  one  crop  of  conten- 
tions and  simultaneously  sown  another.  The  peace  which 
followed  it  has  left  Europe  split  up  into  truculent  factions  with 
a  strong  Slavonic  bent,  for  as  a  few  hundred  years  ago  the  Turks 
were  outside  the  gates  of  Vienna  so  are  the  Slavs  there  to-day. 
That  the  League  of  Nations  can  maintain  any  semblance  of  peace 
between  these  resuscitated  nations  is  improbable,  seeing  that  this 
league  possesses  no  political  power.  Some  other  solution  must 
be  sought,  and  one  which  is  not  solely  concerned  with  preventing 
the  decadence  of  peace.  This  solution,  I  believe,  will  be  discovered 
in  a  new  political  outlook  which  will  aim  at  the  creation  of 
spiritually  healthy  nations  in  open  and  equitable  competition, 
nations  which  understand  the  meaning  of  peace  and  the  power 
of  war  to  enforce  this  meaning. 


The  Peace  which  Passeth  Understanding    275 

I  have  already  shown  that  the  present  position  of  political 
election  has  outgrown  its  original  utility  and  is  fast  becoming 
moribund.  Further  back,  I  described  how  the  primitive  State 
possessed  a  threefold  nature  in  order  to  secure  the  activities 
and  instincts  of  its  people.  To  enable  the  people  to  thrive 
economically,  the  soldier  protected  them  and  enforced  order, 
the  judicature  formulated  laws  in  accordance  with  the  will  of 
the  most  able,  and  the  Church  combined  all  classes  in  a  spiritual 
whole  by  endowing  all  with  a  common  origin  and  a  common  end  ; 
Adam  was  the  primal  father  and  heaven  or  hell  the  final  goal  of 
both  rich  and  poor. 

To-day  this  triple  state  does  not  exist,  for  government  has 
been  swallowed  up  by  economics  ;  it  has  in  fact  infringed  the  rights 
of  the  individual  and  suppressed  the  hunting  spirit,  hence  many 
troubles.  Religion  has  lost  its  sting,  and  with  the  weakening 
of  the  fears  of  hell  the  blessings  of  heaven  have  become  counter- 
feit celestial  coin.  Once  human  life  was  looked  upon  as  an  analogy ; 
to-day  it  is,  for  the  masses,  but  a  cog  in  a  tyrannical  machine. 
What  we  must  reinstate  is  free  work  guaranteed  by  common 
rights,  impelled  forward  by  the  liberty  of  labour  and  secured  by 
military  force.  For  a  moment,  I  will  consider  the  nature  of 
life,  which  to-day  is  obscured  under  a  mass  of  absurd  idealism. 

Life  is  a  dynamic  force,  it  is  the  swinging  pendulum.  It  can- 
not be  regulated  by  a  fixed  idea  or  system.  No  definite  social 
architecture  can  be  designed  to  meet  its  needs,  for  it  is  ever 
growing  and  changing  its  shape.  Spiritually,  man's  sense  of 
dignity  has  evolved  out  of  his  instinct  of  self-distinction,  that 
instinct  which  impels  him  to  excel  others  so  that  he  may  morally 
as  well  as  physically  secure  himself  against  their  competition. 

From  this  instinct  is  developed  pride  of  work,  which  dis- 
tinguished the  guilds  of  the  Middle  Ages,  but  which  to-day 
has  been  extinguished  by  quantity  production.  In  this  age 
of  steam-craft  the  worker  has  become  slave  to  the  engine, 
at  most  he  has  become  but  a  part  of  the  machine ;  con- 
sequently, his  whole  outlook  is  mechanical ;  not  only  does  he 
see  himself  as  a  cog  but  the  whole  world  as  a  complex  series  of 

18* 


276  The  Reformation  of  War 

cogs  slowly  grinding  each  other  to  pieces.  With  a  loss  in  the 
love  of  work,  he  has  lost  his  freedom. 

When  religion  was  a  living,  all-penetrating  force,  the  worker 
beheld  himself  as  a  living  part  of  a  great  dynamic  scheme  in 
which  all  toil  was  rounded  off  by  a  peace  beyond  understanding ; 
to-day  he  appears  to  himself  but  a  fragment  of  animated  matter. 
Then  he  looks  upon  those  who  rule  him,  and  he  finds  that  their 
lives  do  not  coincide  with  his  life,  there  is  a  difference.  He  does 
not  understand  that  this  difference  is  due  to  leisure  (love), 
which  enables  those  who  enjoy  it  to  free  themselves  from  the 
mechanism  of  toil  by  exercising  liberty  in  the  choice  of  pleasures. 
In  place,  he  merely  sees  the  difference,  which,  obsessed  as  he  is 
by  the  machine  his  master,  appears  to  him  to  be  mechanical 
in  character.  Some  cogs  are  better  lubricated  than  others ; 
here,  then,  is  the  source  of  the  difference ;  there  are  two  classes 
of  cogs — the  rich  and  the  poor ;  destroy  this  distinction  and  the 
difference  will  be  made  good.  How  can  it  be  destroyed  ?  By 
abolishing  the  privileges  of  property,  hence  the  tragedy  of  Russia. 

This  absurd  mechanical  outlook  on  life  is  the  result  of  the 
quantity  theory  which  is  the  basis  of  the  modern  capitalist 
system.  The  capitalist  is  also  the  materialist,  and  Quantity  is 
his  god.  As  in  military  organization,  quantity  or  numbers, 
as  I  have  shown,  forms  the  pivot  of  the  traditional  theory  of 
war,  so  in  economics  and  finance  does  quantity  form  the  pivot 
of  the  present  traditional  theory  of  prosperity.  To  the  capi- 
talist labour  is  but  a  commodity ;  once  man  himself  in  the  form 
of  a  slave  was  looked  upon  as  a  chattel,  a  thing  to  be  bought 
and  sold ;  now  it  is  his  ability  to  work  which  is  bartered.  But 
man  is  not  a  commodity,  neither  is  his  ability  to  work  a  com- 
modity ;  it  is  a  living  force  which  cannot  be  measured  with 
pint  pot  or  by  foot  rule.  Man  has  a  right  to  his  activities ; 
at  least  he  has  a  right  to  protect  them,  also  has  he  a  right  to 
his  leisure.  The  worker  feels  this,  but  he  cannot  express  it  as 
long  as  he  is  obsessed  by  the  machine.  Therefore,  if  a  solution 
is  to  be  sought,  he  must  be  brought  to  master  the  machine  so 
that  he  may  regulate  his  leisure  and  regain  his  lost  freedom. 


The  Peace  which  Passeth  Understanding    277 

True  leisure  is  but  the  free  enjoyment  of  the  hunting  spirit ; 
it  is,  therefore,  a  vent  for  those  forces  which,  if  suppressed,  seek 
exercise  in  discontent  and  war.  Leisure  is,  consequently,  the 
foundation  of  domestic  peace.  To  obtain  leisure,  the  worker 
must  become  an  active  force  in  place  of  a  passive  working  tool. 
In  his  work  he  must  be  brought  to  find  a  similar  interest  he 
normally  finds  in  his  home.  Interest  is  the  analogy  of  success 
and  failure,  a  series  of  expectant  spasms  of  joy  and  sorrow. 
To  gain  this  interest  the  worker  must  control  his  work  so  that 
the  exercise  of  his  ability  may  replace  the  mere  exercise  of  his 
muscles.  Then  will  his  prosperity  depend  not  so  much  on  his 
work  as  on  his  skill — skill  is  but  another  name  for  self-distinc- 
tion— and  through  this  instinct  will  he  regain  his  soul  and  learn 
that  the  problems  of  life  are  neither  problems  of  quantity  or 
numbers,  but  are  dynamic  problems  common  to  all.  Also  will  he 
find  that  they  can  only  be  attained  by  an  integration  of  those 
living  forces  which  together  create  freedom  for  the  common  good. 

It  is  difficult  to  explain  in  a  few  words  the  full  meaning 
of  this  spirituality,  which  has  nothing  to  do  with  prayers  and 
hymn  singing,  but  everything  with  the  free  exercise  of  the 
hunting  spirit  in  man.  Sufficient,  I  hope,  has  been  written 
to  enable  the  reader  to  realize  that,  if  society  is  to  be  freed 
from  its  present  traditions,  the  existing  political  systems  of  all 
civilized  nations  will  have  to  undergo  a  drastic  change. 

Before  the  steam  epoch,  government  was  mainly  concerned 
in  correlating  man  and  the  external  world.  To-day  the  political 
outlook  is  pseudo-economic,  the  interests  of  the  nation  having 
been  replaced  by  the  prejudices  of  the  ruling  party.  Socializa- 
tion is  not  only  no  cure  but  an  actual  accentuation  of  disease, 
as  it  must  lead  to  a  purely  mechanical  political  outlook. 
Nationalization  is  the  worst  of  all  forms  of  government,  because 
economics  express  the  hunting  spirit  and  are,  consequently, 
the  domain  of  the  individual.  The  rights  which  underlie  them, 
the  canalization  of  the  human  instincts  and  the  economical 
utilization  of  their  recoil,  as  well  as  the  general  security  of  the 
nation,  these  and  these  only  are  the  true  purposes  of  politics. 


278  The  Reformation  of  War 

How  this  system  of  politics  should  be  organized  is  too  exten- 
sive a  subject  to  discuss  here.  All  I  can  say  is  that  the  model 
to  follow  is  the  body  of  man.  Man's  object  is  to  live ;  in  other 
words,  his  object  is  economic  and  ethical  in  nature.  The 
hidden  forces  which  impel  man  to  maintain  it  are  his  instincts, 
to  protect  it  his  cunning  and  strength,  and  when  man  meets 
man  in  peaceful  competition  from  their  common  purposes  are 
rights  evolved.  So  also  with  the  body  social.  In  peace  its 
forces  must  be  canalized  so  that  they  may  produce  content- 
ment, and  organized  so  that  they  may  be  secured  against 
extinction. 

Until  the  present  political  quantity  idea  is  replaced  by  an 
idea  which  expresses  a  true  relativity  between  the  human 
energies,  it  will  be  most  difficult  to  evolve  from  the  traditional 
theory  of  warfare  the  theory  which  in  this  book  I  have  called 
the  moral  attack.  We  dare  not  stand  still.  It  is  sheer  folly  to 
sit  down  monk-like  and  copy  out,  however  carefully,  past  systems, 
for  if  the  world  is  ever  to  be  delivered  from  the  horrors  of  war 
then  the  road  which  must  be  followed  is  the  track  which  leads 
towards  the  angel  and  not  towards  the  ape.  I  believe  that  wars 
are  inevitable,  but  I  also  believe  that  to  copy  the  last  war  is 
criminal,  and  that  salvation  from  destruction  is  to  be  found 
in  searching ;  then,  quite  possibly,  a  day  will  dawn  when  wars 
will  be  decided  upon  a  chess-board.  Finally  I  would  ask  the 
reader  to  ponder  these  last  words.  The  goal  of  humanity  is 
far  distant ;  in  a  thousand  years  this  present  age  of  ours  will 
be  looked  upon  as  a  barbarous  epoch,  our  politics  will  be  con- 
sidered fantastic,  our  military  art  brutal  and  our  social  troubles 
rather  petty  if  not  comic  affairs.  The  road  towards  this  goal 
runs  along  an  upward  rise.  The  way  is  dark  and  infested  with 
phantoms :  the  devils  of  the  past,  the  angels  of  the  future. 
Directly  angels  are  compelled  to  our  will  they  shrivel  into 
demoniacal  forms  and  beckon  us  to  halt  and  in  our  hearts 
whisper  strange  and  enticing  words.  Heed  them  not,  for 
righteousness  is  attainable  only  by  the  strong,  the  fearless  and 
the  virile — there  is  no  short  cut  to  Paradise. 


EPILOGUE 

PEACE 

It  may  be  thought,  after  reading  this  book,  or  even  after  having 
merely  glanced  through  it,  that  I,  its  writer,  intoxicated  on  strong 
ale,  have  wished  to  cry  with  Pistol :  "  Why,  then  the  world's 
mine  oyster,  which  I  with  sword  will  open  ;  "  and  the  reader, 
if  in  disposition  he  be  contrary  to  war,  may  perhaps  answer 
with  Falstaff :  "  Reason,  you  rogue,  reason  :  thinkest  thou, 
I'll  endanger  my  soul  gratis  ?  At  a  word  hang  no  more  about 
me  ;  I  am  no  gibbet  for  you."  Consequently,  I  must  now  rest 
my  pen,  but,  before  doing  so,  will,  in  this  epilogue,  once  again 
inform  the  reader  that  my  object  has  been  not  to  hasten  the 
advent  of  the  next  great  war  but  to  examine  its  nature.  To 
show  that  without  understanding  the  causes  of  war  we  can  never 
hope  for  stability  of  peace  ;  to  show  that,  as  long  as  peaceful- 
ness  is  not  healthy  and  clean,  war,  in  one  form  or  another,  is 
a  very  necessary  cleanser  and  social  tonic,  and  ultimately  that 
peace  and  war  are,  in  fact,  the  halves  of  one  diameter,  the 
circumference  of  which  is  the  circle  of  existence. 

We  may  or  may  not  love  war,  or  even  a  remembrance  of 
war  or  a  suggestion  of  its  recurrence,  and,  whether  we  human 
beings  be  of  divine  origin  or  but  a  squared  stone  in  the  evolu- 
tionary temple  of  the  Great  Architect,  all  our  instincts  so  far 
go  to  prove  that  we  are  animals ;  some  of  us  gentle,  others 
ferocious,  and  that  those  of  carnivorous  taste  live  on  those 
who  browse  the  tender  herbs  of  life.  We  are  slaves  of  a  hunting 
spirit,  which  we  may  quell  but  cannot  slay. 

Not  understanding  this,  and  not  understanding  what  peace 
and  war  really  mean,  we  are  subject  to  innumerable  phantasies, 

279 


280  The  Reformation  of  War 

hallucinations  which  lead  us  astray,  and  never  more  so  than 
after  some  great  awakening,  when  the  nerves  are  yet  on  edge, 
as  they  are  to-day,  since  the  world  is  still  suffering  from  "  shell 
shock."  It  yearns  for  peace,  but  it  is  too  irritable  to  understand 
that  peace  requires  quietude. 

The  great  danger  is  that  this  irritability  may  consolidate 
into  a  chronic  social  disease — crowd  rule  ;  a  rule  without  ob- 
jective, or  perhaps  with  a  mixture  of  incompatible  objectives, 
such  as — liberty,  equality  and  fraternity,  all  blurred  into  a 
hideous  contradiction.  Nationality  has  become  self-determina- 
tion. To  determine  what  ?  Has  the  crowd  ever  determined 
anything  save  chaos  and  anarchy  ?  Determine  their  material 
existence,  say  you  ?  But  surely  determination  cannot  be 
guaranteed  merely  by  stuffing  slips  of  paper  into  a  ballot-box, 
for  it  requires  strength  and  right  to  enforce  and  maintain  its 
limits.  The  desire  of  the  populace,  be  it  well  remembered,  is 
similar  to  the  love  of  Proteus  :  "  Which,  like  a  waxen  image  'gainst 
a  fire,  bears  no  impression  of  the  thing  it  was."  The  slightest 
friction  melts  and  disfigures  it,  it  is  amorphous  and  unstable. 

Peace  built  on  mob  rule  and  desire  is  but  a  cloud  castle 
which  is  brought  low  in  showers  of  blood  on  the  first  rumble  of 
war.  The  crowd,  the  oldest  of  gatherings,  is  still  incomprehensible 
to  itself,  it  cannot  learn.  The  first  crowd  was  Adam  and  Eve, 
and  the  fall  was  not  the  result  of  some  stupendous  crime,  some 
fearful  cataclysm,  but  of  a  thing  good  to  eat — an  apple.  Nearly 
every  social  fall  since  has  found  its  origin  in  a  similar  quest — the 
obtaining  of  food.  The  next  two  members  of  human  society 
were — a  rather  weak-charactered  agriculturist  and  a  blood-thirsty 
huntsman,  the  eternal  opposites  ;  and  the  squabble  was  once 
again  over  food — the  allegory  is,  therefore,  correct  to  life. 

Like  Abel,  the  normal  citizen  rightly  desires  peace,  and 
though  for  the  sake  of  personal  distinction,  the  soldier,  during 
peace  time,  proclaims  his  love  for  war,  most  soldiers  when  it 
comes  to  : 

"  The  groan,  the  roll  in  dust,  the  all-white  eye 
Turned  back  within  its  socket  .  .  ." 


Epilogue  281 

have  learnt  to  sympathize  with  the  boy  in  King  Henry  V.  who 
exclaimed  :  "  Would  I  were  in  an  ale-house  in  London  I  I 
would  give  all  my  fame  for  a  pot  of  ale,  and  safety."  So  also 
does  the  soldier  love  peace,  and  never  more  so  than  when  the 
wrack  and  ruin  of  war  surround  him,  for  peace  is  his  normal 
state  of  healthy  and  unhealthy  life,  and,  being  normal,  neither 
he  nor  his  black-coated  brother  understands  the  curative  proper- 
ties of  war.  Instead  they  seek  balsams  from  mad  chemists 
who,  while  searching  for  strange  herbs,  in  their  progress  scatter 
the  thistledown  of  war  in  their  fields,  and  returning,  wonder 
why  the  seeds  of  war  have  destroyed  their  money-making 
crops. 

HONOUR 

There  is  only  one  balsam  which  can  make  peace  worth  living 
— honour,  which  is  righteousness.  There  are  sublimer  ideals 
than  mere  peacefulness,  and  honour  is  one  of  these.  Peace  with- 
out honour  is  degradation,  and  as  a  noble  woman  safeguards 
her  honour,  and  will  even  sacrifice  her  life  to  maintain  it  in  order 
to  keep  the  family  clean,  and  as  a  man  will  give  his  life  to  pro- 
tect her  and  her  children,  so  will  an  upright  nation,  because  of 
its  honour,  not  only  protect  but  sacrifice  itself  for  a  righteous 
cause.  All  may  be  lost  save  honour,  for  without  honour  man- 
kind ceases  to  be  human. 

It  is  the  family  spirit  which  is  the  predominant  instinct 
in  peace  and  war  ;  and  when  the  nation  is  engulfed  in  woe, 
in  discord  and  unrighteousness,  when  righteous  men  can  with 
Gonzalo,  that  honest  old  counsellor,  say  :  "All  torment,  trouble, 
wonder  and  amazement  inhabits  here,"  then  it  is  honour 
which  is  the  "  heavenly  power  "  which  will  guide  us  "  out  of 
this  fearful  country  !  "  Honour  is  the  essence  of  that  fellow- 
ship which  Henry  V.  acclaims  when  he  cries : 

"  That  he  which  hath  no  stomach  to  this  fight, 
Let  him  depart ;   his  passport  shall  be  made, 
And  crowns  of  convoy  put  into  his  purse  : 
We  would  not  die  in  that  man's  company 
That  fears  his  fellowship  to  die  with  us." 


282  The  Reformation  of  War 

Honour  includes  esteem,  respect,  integrity  and  scorn  of  mean- 
ness, and  in  a  free  and  honourable  nation  every  member  of  it, 
however  poor,  has  a  citizen's  right  to  be  treated  as  an  honourable 
man.  To  despise  a  man  because  his  calling  does  not  coincide 
with  our  own  is  a  dishonourable  act  not  only  to  the  individual 
but  to  the  State  itself. 

The  nation  which  depends  for  the  security  of  its  honour  on  some 
international  police  force  has  become  but  a  kept-woman  among 
nations.  There  is  only  one  guardian  of  honour — a  virile  arm 
backed  by  a  virile  brain.  Again,  a  State  which  is  not  prepared 
to  defend  its  honour  by  a  righteous  war,  and  depends  on  the 
benevolence  of  others  to  guarantee  its  existence  when  its  life  is 
threatened,  is  but  a  paralytic  living  in  an  almshouse ;  it  has 
scarcely  the  right  to  live,  for  it  lacks  the  might  to  thrive. 

WAR 

If  honour  be  worth  safeguarding,  war  sooner  or  later  becomes 
inevitable,  for,  in  this  world,  there  are  always  to  be  found  dis- 
honourable men,  and  if  war  does  not  range  a  nation  against 
these,  then  must  vice  live  triumphant.  It  is  with  this  uncon- 
tradictable  quality  in  human  nature  set  clear  before  him  which 
impelled  Ruskin  to  write  in  his  "  Crown  of  Wild  Olives  "  : 

"  I  found  that  all  great  nations  learned  their  truth  of  word,  and 
strength  of  thought,  in  war ;  that  they  were  nourished  in  war,  and 
wasted  by  peace ;  taught  by  war,  and  betrayed  by  peace :  in  a  word, 
that  they  were  born  in  war,  and  expired  in  peace. 

"The  habit  of  living  light-heartedly,  in  daily  presence  of  Death, 
always  has  had,  and  must  have,  a  tendency  to  the  making  and  testing 
of  honest  men. 

"  War  in  which  the  natural  instincts  of  self-defence  are  sanctified  by 
the  nobleness  of  the  institutions,  and  purity  of  the  households,  which 
they  are  appointed  to  defend :  to  such  war  as  this  all  men  are  born ; 
in  such  war  as  this  any  man  may  happily  die ;  and  forth  from  such 
war  as  this  have  arisen,  throughout  the  extent  of  past  ages,  all  the 
highest  sanctities  and  virtues  of  humanity." 

In  order  to  protect  our  homes  and  our  institutions  we  must 
not  only  protect  our  army  and  look  upon  it  as  our  shield  against 
adversity,  but  we  must  determine  whether  the  shield  we  have  is 


Epilogue  283 

worthy  to  protect  us.  In  this  book  I  have  examined  the  possi- 
bilities of  future  warfare  in  order  to  lead  up  to  this  conclusion. 
I  feel  that  I  have  written  enough  to  enable  any  intelligent  citizen, 
after  he  has  studied  what  I  have  said,  to  turn  to  the  army  he  is 
paying  for  in  order  to  maintain  the  peace  which  he  enjoys  and  to 
say  :  "  Thou  art,  or  thou  art  not,  found  wanting."  If  the  former, 
then  it  is  he  who  can  effect  the  change  and  not  the  soldier,  who  is 
but  an  instrument  directed  by  the  policy  which  the  civilian  creates. 
To-day,  though  we  have  but  emerged  from  the  greatest  war 
in  history,  never  has  England  been  more  in  need  of  a  reliable 
army,  not  only  to  defend  her  gates  but  to  defend  her  hearths, 
to  maintain  the  policy  chosen  by  her  people  against  the  wanton 
desires  of  diseased  fanatics — word-mongers,  corner-boys  of 
literature  and  "  Trafalgar-squared  "  crowds.  To  create  or  change 
a  policy  is  neither  the  right  nor  the  duty  of  the  soldier,  for  the  sword 
is  the  instrument  of  policy  and  not  its  fashioner.  Unfortunately 
for  us,  sedition  gropes  about  the  world,  and  as  Launce  said  to  his 
dog :  "  O  !  'tis  a  foul  thing  when  a  cur  cannot  keep  himself 
in  all  companies  ;  "  so  have  we,  for  a  space,  to  live  in  evil-smelling 
surroundings.  But  only  for  a  space,  for  the  World  Spirit  is 
abroad,  he  never  rests ;  sometimes  he  moves  like  a  shadow, 
sometimes  with  the  stride  of  a  giant — ever  are  his  footsteps 
measuring  the  earth.  To  each  nation  he  is  their  national  spirit, 
and  to  us  that  spiritual  voice  which  the  greatest  of  Englishmen 
still  renders  audible  to  all  and  resonant,  even  thunderous,  to 
many  in  the  words  of  Philip  the  Bastard  : 

"  O  !  let  us  pay  the  time  but  needful  woe 
Since  it  hath  been  beforehand  with  our  griefs. 
This  England  never  did,  nor  never  shall, 
Lie  at  the  proud  foot  of  a  conqueror, 
But  when  it  first  did  help  to  wound  itself. 
Now  these  her  princes  are  come  home  again, 
Come  the  three  corners  of  the  world  in  arms, 
And  we  shall  shock  them.     Nought  shall  make  us  rue, 
If  England  to  itself  do  rest  but  true." 

Herein  is  the  "  Reveille  "  of  the  English  race,  and  the  "  Last 
Post  "  over  her  enemies  1 

VALE 


APPENDIX 

The  Procedure  of  the  Infantry  Attack.  A  Synthesis  from  a 
Psychological  Standpoint.     R.U.S.I.  Journal,  January,  1914. 

Training  Soldiers  for  War.     Book,  October,  1914. 

The  Tactics  of  Penetration.  A  Counterblast  to  German 
Numerical  Superiority.     R.U.S.I.  Journal,  November,  1914. 

The  Principles  of  War  with  Reference  to  the  Campaigns  of 
1914-1915.     R.U.S.I.  Journal,  February,  1916. 

The  Training  of  the  New  Army,  1803-1805.  R.U.S.I. 
Journal,  November,  1916. 

Instructions  for  the  Training  of  the  Tank  Corps  in  France. 
Pamphlet,  December,  1917. 

Infantry  and  Tank  Co-operation  and  Training.  Pamphlet, 
March,  1918. 

The  Principles  of  War  with  Reference  to  the  Campaigns  of 
1914-1917.     Pamphlet,  March,  1918. 

The  Influence  of  Tanks  on  Military  Operations.  The  Ministry 
of  Munitions  Journal,  December,  1918. 

Tanks  in  the  Great  War.     Book,  February,  1920. 

The  Development  of  Sea  Warfare  on  Land  and  its  Influence  on 
Future  Naval  Operations.     R.U.S.I.  Journal,  May,  1920. 

The  Application  of  Recent  Developments  in  Mechanics  and 
other  Scientific  Knowledge  to  Preparation  and  Training  for  Future 
Wars  on  Land.  R.U.S.I.  Gold  Medal  (Military)  Prize  Essay  for 
1919.     R.U.S.I.  Journal,  May,  1920. 

The  Influence  of  Tanks  on  Cavalry  Tactics.  A  Study  in  the 
Evolution  of  Mobility  in  War.  Cavalry  Journal,  March,  July 
and  October,  1920. 

285 


286  The  Reformation  of  War 

The  Foundations  of  the  Science  of  War.  Army  Quarterly, 
October,  1920. 

Moral,  Instruction  and  Leadership.  R.U.S.I.  Journal,  No- 
vember, 1920. 

The  Introduction  of  Mechanical  Warfare  on  Land  and  its 
Possibilities  in  the  Near  Future.  The  Royal  Engineer  Journal, 
January,  1921. 

The  Tank — Ten  Little  Pictures.  Royal  Military  College 
Magazine  and  Record,  January,  1921. 

The  Secrets  of  Napoleon.     The  National  Review,  May,  1921. 

The  Evolution  of  Mechanical  Warfare.     Pamphlet,  July,  1921. 

Tanks  in  Future  Warfare.  The  Nineteenth  Century  and 
After,  July,  1921. 

The  Purpose  and  Nature  of  a  Fleet.  The  Nineteenth  Century 
and  After,  October,  1921. 

The  Tank — Ten  Possibilities.  Royal  Military  College  Maga- 
zine and  Record,  January,  1922. 

Problems  of  Mechanical  Warfare.  Army  Quarterly,  January, 
1922. 

What  Changes  are  Suggested  in  Naval  Construction  and  Tactics 
as  a  Result  of  {a)  The  Experiences  of  the  War  ?  (b)  The  Develop- 
ment of  Submarine  and  Aerial  Warfare  in  the  Future?  R.U.S.I. 
First  Naval  Prize  Essay  for  1920.  The  Naval  Review,  February, 
1922. 

Economic  Movement.  The  Civil  and  Military  Possibilities 
of  Roadless  Traction  in  the  Near  Future.  Pamphlet,  September, 
1922. 

The  Influence  of  Aircraft  on  Imperial  Defence.  The  Naval 
Review,  February,  1923. 


Appendix  287 


ARTICLES  PRIVATELY  PRINTED 

Infantry  and  Tank  Battle  Formations. 

Man's  Place  in  Battle. 

The  Evolution  of  Mechanics  in  War. 

The  Influence  of  Petrol  on  Land  Operations. 

The  Development  of  Gas  and  its  Influence  on  Tank  Warfare. 

Naval  Strategy  and  Tactics  Applied  to  Land  Warfare. 

The  Secret  of  Victory. 

The  Scottish  War  Cart  and  Zisca's  Wagenburg. 

Bloodless  Means  of  Quelling  Civil  Disturbances. 

Road  Capacity  and  Cross-Country  Traction. 

Mechanical  Warfare  on  Land  and  Sea. 

Chinese  Use  of  War  Carts. 

The  Mechanical  Policeman. 

Strategical  Paralysis  as  the  Objective  in  the  Decisive  Attack. 


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